Hermione Granger Weasley, Something Personal
by persevera
Summary: Hermione's newly-wed life is content, but someone from her past suggests she might be missing out on more. Mentors, woodland creatures and a new attitude from Ron figure into Hermione's sexual awakening...nine months into marriage
1. Evaluation

Azkaban Prison, even without the soul-stealing presence of dementors, was a desolate place. It was still a bleak, rocky island with waves crashing against it, sending up spray that could, without warning, soak any visitor.

Hermione Granger Weasley never thought that she would see it, let alone have monthly visits there with prospective parolees. She used her wand to dry her ministerial robe. She had her hair pinned back but the tendrils that escaped framed the obviously young and feminine face, making her effort to appear somber and asexual completely futile.

In her entrance level position with the law enforcement section at the Ministry of Magic, she was responsible for evaluating the rehabilitation and potential of some of the people she'd fought in the Second Wizarding War.

"Damned Death Eaters," she said resignedly, looking over the names of those with whom she'd meet that day. The minister was anxious to heal wounds from the war and re-integrate some of Voldemort's repentant followers into society. Hermione was skeptical, however, of the likelihood of reform from life-long prejudice.

"Scabior: Snatcher," she read from the file. She had particularly bad memories of Snatchers, having evaded them with Harry and Ron for months before the Battle for Hogwarts, so she was anxious for a quick consultation to then cross that name off her list and out of her mind.

He sauntered into the interrogation room, pushing his dark, curly hair off of his forehead. Per her ministry training, she stood for a perfunctory handshake. He, however, just took the chair on the other side of the wooden table, stretched out his long, lean frame, and grinned up at her. "Hel-lo, Ms. Granger," he said in a tone that could most accurately be described as flirtatious.

She gave him a cold look, as she took her seat. "Mr. Scabior," she began, "you have served three years of your 10-year sentence. You have no killings on your record, though it appears that you did use the Cruciatus Curse on several occasions. Do you regret this action?"

"I have a lot of regrets for what I did as a Snatcher," he said. Hermione looked up at his face to see if the remorse she detected was genuine.

"My greatest regret is taking a beautiful young woman I'd found with two boys to Malfoy Manor, where she was tortured by the mad Lestrange woman."

Hermione gaped. She hadn't recognized the name and the face looked so different—not sneering and jaded. He looked at her as if asking for her personal forgiveness.

"I hope it doesn't still hurt you," he said softly, looking at her arm. "Her snake lash burns every so often," he added, running his fingertips along the pale, red line around his neck, "even if it didn't quite kill me."

Hermione pulled the sleeve of her robe down over her arm, where Bellatrix had branded her with the word "Mudblood," and tucked her arms against her chest. She shook her head and looked down at the table.

Scabior continued his concentration on her. "I should've taken only the boys there and kept you with me. You would've been safe."

She laughed nervously, daring a fleeting glance at his sculpted, swarthy face. "Safe with a Death Eater," she said, a little too loudly, the sound echoing from the stone walls and floor of the stark, window-less room.

He shrugged. "I wasn't so much pro-Voldemort as anti-Gryffindor. But yes, I would've protected you, even though your colors were red and gold."

She looked at him quizzically. He shook his head. "You wouldn't understand," he said (sadly?).

"Shall we get on with it?" Hermione asked, pushing up the sleeves of her robe and attempting to regain her professional demeanor.

He nodded, not breaking his gaze from her.

She looked down at her folder. "Now you understand that for your probationary period, you are not permitted to have a wand."

He frowned without anger and shrugged again. "No matter—I don't need one. Would you like to know an Azkaban secret?" he asked, leaning forward against the table.

He was close enough for Hermione to catch his scent—bracing from the ocean, and pheromone-laden, suggesting someone who regularly worked up a good sweat through exercise or…

She nodded quickly to stop her thoughts. She didn't realize it but she leaned forward a little also.

His voice seemed to take on the cadence of hypnosis. "Some of us have disciplined ourselves so well, that we can do magic with our minds and hands as well as someone with a wand. Do you want me to show you?"

She found herself staring into his dark eyes and nodding again.

He smiled and, curling his fingers in and out, whispered "Masseo." Hermione suddenly rolled her shoulder, as she felt the kneading and loosening of her taut muscles.

Scabior's smile widened. "Yeah, I though that's where the tension was—right there in your left shoulder blade. It's better now, yes?"

She tried to give him a hostile look but it ended up being more curious, with her eyebrows lifting rather than coming together in a frown.

He leaned back and crossed his legs, with one foot resting on the opposite knee. "Do you want to know what my intentions are?"

"I beg your pardon?" she asked, confused. What kind of intentions was he talking about?

He grinned. "Do you want to know what I plan to do with my life when I leave here? It's part of your evaluation, isn't it?"

"Oh, of course," she said, returning to the forms and picking up her quill pen. "What are your…intentions…when you leave here?" She licked her dry lips before looking up at him.

With his elbow on the armrest and his arm upright, he lightly ran the back of a finger over his pursed mouth. "I might go to America, find a woman who doesn't know my reputation."

"Your reputation as a Death Eater," Hermione clarified, pushing an errant wisp of her brown hair behind her ear.

He gave a silent laugh. "I meant my reputation as a 'love 'em and leave 'em' kind of man."

"And you have to move to another continent to counter that," she said with an attempt at sarcasm and derision.

He was unaffected by the tone. "You might have found out for yourself, if you hadn't still been a schoolgirl at the start of the war."

She looked down quickly and shuffled the papers in front of her. "…and you hadn't already been here," she said, not realizing she had just acknowledged the possibility of her otherwise having learned about him as a lover.

He did realize it and smiled ironically. "I hear you married the ginger," he said.

Hermione kept her face down. "That's none of your business," she said forcefully.

"Of course not," he agreed. "It's none of my business if you're happy and satisfied with him either. But I wonder anyway. Is he…appreciating his lovely young wife, and making her feel it the way he should?"

She cleared her throat, her movements becoming hurried, as she stood with her folder. "I believe we're done, Mr. Scabior. I'll have someone else from the Ministry come to conduct your interview—someone who has no previous contact with you."

"But if I don't finish the evaluation, I'm stuck here another six months before I get a chance again," he said plaintively. "Please, I won't interrupt you again. Evaluate me."

She looked at him doubtfully. "Please," he asked with humility.

She sat back down and re-opened Scabior's file. "Fine," she said officiously, checking off the items for which she already had answers. "Would you consider yourself reformed and ready to be a productive member of society?"

"Yes."

"Have you learned enough skills during your incarceration that you can make a valuable contribution, rather than being a burden to your fellow citizens?"

"Yes."

"Do you have a support group of family and/or friends outside of Azkaban to provide you with encouragement and aid, if needed?"

There was no response.

"Mr. Scabior," she said, looking up and seeing a sad expression on his face.

"No. Everyone I've ever cared about or who has ever cared about me is dead."

She felt more sympathy for him after that statement than she knew she should. "I'm sorry," she mumbled, quickly looking back down to note his answer in the file.

"Is that a disqualifier?" he asked.

"No," she answered, not daring to look in his sad, dark brown eyes again. "We'll just have to match you with a community volunteer to help you in your re-introduction to freedom."

"That's a beautiful word," he said sweetly.

Hermione felt the corners of her mouth lift in a tiny smile. "One last question—I see here that you were originally scheduled for evaluation and possible release three months ago and you withdrew your name from consideration with no explanation. Can you say why now?"

He hesitated. "Is this the last question? You're not going to run away leaving me only partially evaluated if you don't like the answer?"

"This is the last question but we need to understand what has happened between then and now," she reiterated.

"Alright," he said. "I withdrew because I wanted you."

She looked at him, surprised but not really offended.

He continued. "I heard you'd be doing the evaluations in the next quarter. I wanted to see you to apologize and see that you're happy and, as I said, satisfied. I've done my part. You, however, don't seem satisfied, Ms. Granger."

"That's Mrs. Weasley," she corrected quietly.

"The nameplate on your satchel says Granger," he said, pointing to the bag on the table.

"That's just for work," she said, as if that cleared up everything.

Scabior grinned. "Does that mean there's something personal between us, Mrs. Weasley?"

"That's not what I meant," she said with frustration in her voice. She looked at him as if asking him to give her a break.

"I know," he responded, relenting on his teasing. "I'm sorry. I just couldn't resist. Now is this the part of the interview when you ask me if I have any questions?"

"You mean besides that one," she said with a self-conscious laugh. "Yes. Do you have any questions—not of a personal nature," she emphasized.

He gave her his biggest smile yet and Hermione saw that when he wasn't trying to get the better of her that he could look pleasant. She refused to say handsome, even to herself.

"First I'd like to make sure you have my future address correct," he stated.

Hermione consulted the file. "The Inn at Helga's Hill, Room 10," she read.

Scabior smiled and nodded. "If you could confirm something for me…I've been told that it's now possible for someone in the Ministry to Disapparate from anywhere in the building and reappear anywhere, as long as he or she was invited to that location, either formally or through mutual understanding."

Hermione closed the file again. "I've not done it myself but, in theory, yes, that's possible."

He leaned forward again and looked at her intently. "So someone in the Ministry, such as yourself, could leave…say, from your office…and Apparate into a room…at an inn, for instance…as long as you had been invited there… either formally or through mutual understanding…without anyone knowing, except the person who made the invitation…correct?"

She nodded slowly, her heart beating quickly.

He smiled, as he rose from the chair. "By the way, I want to make a change in my file. The room number at the inn will be 15, rather than 10. You might make a note of that. Goodbye, Ms. Granger-Weasley. It's been a pleasure seeing you. I hope to do so again."

He sauntered out of the room.

Hermione sat at the table, taking deep breaths until she felt calmer. She opened the file and changed the number on the address line, subconsciously committing that information to memory.


	2. Very Happy Together

_**a/n Thank you, HP readers, for your interest in this story. I don't own Harry Potter or anything else of such monumental value**_

Hermione and Ron had been married for nine months and were very happy together. They lived in a trendy, young area of Diagon Alley. She had her job at the Ministry and he had his in the same department, as an auror in-training.

They spent most of their spare time with Harry, also an auror in-training, though at a higher level than Ron. Harry was lonely for Ginny, who was touring with the Holyhead Harpies. Harry's own quidditch career had ended abruptly with an accident to his hand that made him less adept at clutching the golden snitch. When Ginny wasn't touring though, she, of course, rounded out the routine foursome.

Hermione was reflective on her commute home by the Knight Bus, after her consultations at Azkaban. Why would Scabior think she wasn't satisfied? She and Ron were very happy together. Their bickering was just…who they were. They had good friends and work that they enjoyed. They had their future planned, which was important to Hermione. What more could they possibly want?

She arrived home to find Ron and Harry already there, drinking butterbeer and playing wizard's chess.

"Hi, Honey," Ron said as she came through the door, "what's for dinner?"

She chose not to see the empty bottles and jackets and shoes strewn carelessly in the otherwise tidy living room.

His question sounded so familiar to her—not only because she heard it almost every day, but she also had heard it, plus "what's for breakfast" "what's there to eat…" every day on the trio's quest for horcruxes.

"I haven't been to the market," she said apologetically. "I'll have to see what I can find."

"You're getting lax in your duties, Luv," Ron mumbled, concentrating on the gameboard. "Ha, check, Harry," he said with more animation. "Come on, bishop. Show 'im what for."

Hermione went into the kitchen and began looking through the cupboards. Her mind returned to their time on the lam—arguing over food, feeling the negative effects of the necklace horcrux, grateful for any break from the mundane, even, she realized, almost being discovered by Scabior.

She set the potatoes peeling and knife chopping vegetables for a salad. She remembered that twilight when she saw him, felt his hot breath on her, and stood motionless, wondering whether or not he was going to reach out for her, as he seemed to sense her presence through all of their camouflage charms. She'd been terrified, of course, but understood now that that wasn't her only reaction. She had also been excited.

She was quiet through dinner, as the young men discussed their latest case.

She read her department policy manuals and memos again, while they listened to a quidditch match.

It occurred to her that there wouldn't be much reward for this reading. There wouldn't be a test over the material, no O to expect from an essay she might write on it. No one required that. In some ways her life was very similar to her school days and in other ways, lacking the satisfaction that she'd received for a job well done.

Hermione gasped, as she realized the context in which that word had come to her. Was that why she didn't seem to be satisfied…because she didn't have the same intellectual challenges? No, that couldn't be it. Scabior had no idea how much Hermione had loved the mental stimulation and how much she'd sacrificed for it.

_What sacrifice?_ she asked herself, as that thought came unbidden to her musings.

She did an expanding charm on the bathtub, turning it into a pool of hot water in which she could release some of the stress in her muscles. How did he know exactly where her tension was earlier? Was she somehow telegraphing it, or was he just so attentive that he noticed what others would miss? "That might be a bit creepy," her rational side said. Her body, however, loved the relief and now seemed to tingle when she thought about it or him.

Maybe she was just spending too much time alone, letting her thoughts stray to him. Maybe she should be with her husband.

She quickly stepped out of the pool and shrank it to its original size. She dried with one towel then wrapped a dry, super-soft one around herself and walked into the bedroom, wearing an inviting smile.

Her gesture was lost on Ron though, since he had already used his deluminator to darken the room. He yawned as she crawled into bed. "I'm beat," he said. He gave her a small kiss, said good night then turned on his side away from her.

Hermione sat up in bed and looked at his back for a moment. "Good night," she said in a small voice. She rose to put on her pajamas then got back in bed. She had needed to feel close to him. She lay looking at his back and tried to sleep through a jumble of thoughts.

Was closeness…intimacy one of the things she'd sacrificed? It probably didn't count though because the need for that was a recent discovery.

She thought about Viktor, the only other boy she'd ever kissed, if the little pecks she'd allowed could really be considered kissing. Viktor hadn't thought so. He'd kept pressing for more and she'd just give him an exasperated smile then return to whatever book she'd used as a shield to avoid the contact.

She now suspected that part of the reason she'd always sniped at Ron so much was to lessen the intimacy that they might have had. Whether he had really been capable of it or not, he'd conformed to Hermione's admonitions to not be silly or impossible, or whatever the adjective of the day was…and he had stopped.

They weren't celibate but sex was timid yet rushed, almost as perfunctory as a Ministry handshake.

Hermione sighed. Knowing that her life was working out exactly as she'd planned, didn't make it any more tolerable, now that she realized she wanted more.

She continued fretting the rest of the week, missing a lot of sleep. On Saturday Ron and Harry went to Hogwarts for a Gryffindor quidditch match. Hermione no longer had any interest in the game, since she wasn't a student, so she stayed home.

She fell asleep on the couch in the living room and dreamt for the first time that week. She moaned and sighed, as Scabior came to her in the dream. He responded so well and forcefully when she alternately demanded and begged for more.

"Hermione, are you alright?" asked Ron in concern, squatting beside the couch and leaning over her.

She woke when she heard his voice. Still breathing shallowly, she nodded and kissed him multiple times around his face and mouth. "I love you," she said feverishly, trying to bring him up to the level of her arousal.

He closed his eyes, loving what she was doing. "Why don't you get in bed and I'll be there in a few minutes," he said, semi-seductively.

She anxiously went to their room and undressed. Ron excitedly took a shower then deluminated the room, as he crawled into bed with his wife.

His wasn't the presence though that had excited her. Her ardor fizzled, as she realized she couldn't expect more than the usual.

Ron was disheartened when he felt her diminished passion. _Where is it?_ he asked himself, almost desperately, _what did I do wrong now?_

They were committed though so went through the motions. He quickly moved off of her and lay flat on his back, exhausted but unfulfilled.

Hermione masked her frustration by grasping his hand, as they lay next to each other. They exchanged I love yous then went to sleep.

They went to the Burrow for Sunday dinner. George and Harry, a regular at family dinners, teased Ron about whether he and Hermione knew what was necessary for her to become pregnant.

"I'm doin' m'best," Ron joked. Hermione overheard that and nearly cried.

_I hope he's joking. This can't be the best...from either of us. But what if it is and we'll never have more than we did last night?_ She cringed and began to silently panic.

She stayed in the bath that night until she knew Ron was asleep then again slept fitfully.

At the office the next morning, she requested the Azkaban report as soon as it was available. She scanned it eagerly then locked the door of her office. She spun and said, almost like a plea, "the Inn at Helga's Hill, Room 15".

Scabior stood a few feet from her. "Hello, Ms. Granger-Weasley".

She stood without speaking, her heart beating so hard, she knew it could be seen through her Ministry robe.

"Are you lost?" he asked with a smirk.

This was not what Hermione had hoped for from him. "I think I might be," she said sadly. "I'll be going now."

"No," Scabior said quickly, moving to grab her hand, "don't go".

He pulled her into a close embrace, nuzzled her neck and randomly placed small kisses around her face. "Hermione," he said breathily, "can you tell me what you want?"

"Um," she said with nervousness, "I want to know what you meant by being satisfied".

He smiled down at her. "Then you will," he said confidently. "How much time do you have?"

"Two hours."

He put his hands on either side of her face. He talked to her between kisses. "Believe me when I tell you that in two hours you will know what it is to be satisfied...and fully appreciated."

His lips came down on hers in a way that made her forget any other kiss she'd ever had. It was as if her love life had been mercifully obliviated, to be remade in his obviously capable hands.


	3. Mutual Understanding

She lay quietly on her side, looking at the glass on the bedside table. "Do it again," she requested with a bit of fascination in her voice.

Scabior, propped on one elbow lying next to her, ceased his caressing to stretch his arm over her and grasp the glass. He silently moved his hand from the bottom to the rim, filling it with cold water. He handed it to Hermione, who drank deeply then said, "That is so sexy".

He smiled at her with his bright, white teeth and unexpected dimples. "How? It's not like you're new to magic".

She wrapped her arms around his neck, as he placed the glass back on the table. "It's just so elemental. You're not reciting words or using a wand to help you. You're controlling nature with your will."

He smiled again. "I'm not controlling anything. Nature and me have a mutual understanding too."

She grinned up at him. His hand lightly rubbed her neck, as he said, "Darlin', you know you're goin' to have a lot of guilt about this. I want to help you lessen it."

Hermione dropped her eyes and loosened her grasp of him.

"You love your husband, don't you?" he asked in a low voice. She gave a small nod.

Scabior continued, "Does he know how much you love a backrub...or snogging?" He slid his lips lightly along her neck and chest.

"No," she answered."But that's not all his fault. I didn't know how much I loved them until now."

Scabior grinned. "Then you need to train him."

"How?" Hermione asked. "Won't he be suspicious if I go home acting like a completely different person, even though I feel like a completely different person?"

"Sure he would," said Scabior, resuming his caressing. "Start with something small that's important to you, like snogging."

He demonstrated. "The next time he kisses you like this," he said, giving her a little more than a peck, part your lips a tiny bit". She complied.

Then you kiss him and give him just a taste of your tongue..." Again Hermione followed his instruction.

"...and look at him like you are now," he said, eyeing her lustily. "He won't be able to resist you either." He concluded his tutorial with a master kiss.

She wriggled beneath him and sighed, as the heat and excitement between them built again.

"I think it's time for you to learn the sheath command," he said. "You were much too excited earlier and might have done damage to me. But those damned muggle condoms are a nuisance."

Hermione giggled, grabbing her wand from the table.

"Now point," he instructed, "and say 'Prophylla'".

She was always an excellent student.

"Very good," Scabior said approvingly, "nice fit and you left enough room. Do you do everything well?"

"I try," she said. "I love learning anything new".

"That's what I'm here for,"he said with a grin, rolling onto his back and positioning her on top of him. "See how you like the seat of power."

She at first gasped then slowly began to move her hips, while massaging his upper torso. She increased her speed and intensity, rolling her head back...

Delighting in her abandon, Scabior looked toward the door and whispered "Muffliato", re-enforcing his earlier privacy charms. He could tell it would be needed. Hermione was panting. The look on her face was almost desperate, as she looked down at him.

"You're beautiful," he told her, "don't be afraid to let go".

And carefully-contained Hermione screamed.

With that Scabior allowed his own release then pulled her to him tightly. She purred in total satisfaction and lay next to him in pleasurable exhaustion, dramatically throwing her arms wide.

He lifted the arm that fell across his chest and read "Mudblood."

"I'm so sorry, Hermione," he said with a catch in his voice.

"Wha," she asked in confusion, until she realized he was tenderly stroking her bad arm. "It's just...there," she said soothingly. "It doesn't hurt; it's just ugly."

"No," he said fervently, looking at her gamine face, "no part of you could be ugly." He was thoughtful a moment then said, "I want you to brand me".

"What?" She sat up in shock. "No, I couldn't do that. Why would you want that?"

"This is my fault," he said emphatically, still holding her arm, "I need to suffer for it the way you did."

"No," she said in a smaller voice, looking at him almost pleadingly. She knew he had a stronger will than she and she simply didn't want to do it.

"Please, Hermione," he said softly, lowering his head to her, as if in supplication, "it will help cleanse my conscience".

She was nearly crying. She laid her hand on the back of his head and buried her face in his dark curls. "I can't."

"Yes, you can," he said, kissing the palm of her hand and placing her wand in it. "I need for you to."

She sighed in resignation. "What should I say?"

He moved so that he was pressed against her back and held her closely. "Make it something that will always make me think of you like this...something subtle."

Hermione couldn't believe the change in her life in one morning. She was sitting naked in the arms of another man and, at his insistence, about to inflict the pain on him that Bellatrix had on her.

She took a deep breath and recited the incantation that would turn her wand into a branding iron and touched it to his forearm. She heard the sizzle and smelled burning flesh. She felt tension in the body behind her but heard no sound to indicate the agony that she knew from experience he was feeling. Instead he kissed the side of her face, neck and her shoulder and whispered encouragements to her.

She bit her lip and stared down at the arm, as she moved her wand over it, burning in the markings. Then she threw the wand away from her.

Scabior turned her face toward him and kissed her softly. "Thank you," he said.

She gave a tight little nod and didn't speak. He looked down at the symbols on his arm. "What is it?"

She answered quietly, "the rune for two hours in Room 15".

He smiled until the dimples showed. "It's perfect," he said.

He fell back on the bed still holding her and lay with her for a few minutes, stroking her hair and quietly adjusting to the pain. "Is your time almost up?" he asked her reluctantly.

Hermione glanced at her watch then rose to dress.

"Will you visit me again?" Scabior asked.

"Aren't you leaving for America?"

"I'm not goin' to America," he stated. "That thought ended when you accepted my invitation."

"So you decided two hours ago?"

He shook his head. "You accepted my invitation when I first made it. I knew it, even if you didn't. I've been making my plans since then."

"What are you going to do?"

"I'm goin' to Hogwarts to be Hagrid's assistant," he said.

"Really?"

"I worked with the magical creatures at Azkaban; I'm good at it," he stated proudly.

Grinning, Hermione walked over to the side of the bed where he sat. "More mutual understanding with nature," she observed, leaning over him for a last hug and kiss.

"Somethin' like that," he answered.

She stayed in that position, with his arms around her waist. "But I can't see you at Hogwarts," she said.

"Why?"

"Because it's impossible. I'd be recognized, I can't apparate onto the grounds. There's a million reasons."

"You only mentioned two," Scabior said. "Do you want to see me again?"

She considered that. She'd allowed herself this time, thinking he was leaving. Now that she knew there was the possibility for another day like this...she nodded.

"That's all I need to know," he said with finality. "I'll take care of the rest of it."

She retrieved her wand and returned to her original spot, wearing her Ministry robe for her departure. "Goodbye, umm..."

He grinned, "Gareth".

She smiled in return. "Goodbye, Gareth." Calling her destination, she disappeared.

He put his hands behind his head and leaned back, in full appreciation of Hermione Granger-Weasley.


	4. Familiar and New

_**a/n Thanks for the story and author alerts. I definitely don't  
own Harry Potter or any of the characters depicted**_

Returning to her office after her morning with Gareth Scabior, Hermione was a little wobbly and light-headed. The guilt that she thought she would feel was overwhelmed by the endorphins coursing through her. So she hummed, tapped her foot, nearly danced at her desk.

During her lunch break she went to the women's bathroom at the Ministry to shower so she'd be clean when she saw Ron that evening. Thinking of him triggered her feeling of disloyalty. She cried, with the sound of the running water covering her sobs. Her crying wasn't simply because she felt guilty, but because she realized that guilt wouldn't keep her from seeing Scabior again.

She'd enjoyed the time with him too much and felt he still had things to teach her. She wanted to learn from him.

Back in her office she had a message from Ron that he was on the trail of an elusive dark wizard and wouldn't be home that night. She was relieved that she wouldn't have to face him without first reflecting on what she'd done.

"What have you done?" she asked herself. "I've discovered passion with someone I thought that I abhorred. I learned about satisfaction…not only receiving it but giving it too."

She continued her ruminations as she entered the apartment that evening, to be greeted by Crookshanks, her pet cat and familiar.

She sat down and the feline jumped into her lap and locked his green eyes onto hers.

"You know what I did, don't you?"

The cat meowed in answer then affectionately bumped the bottom of Hermione's chin with his head.

"You're not angry?" Hermione was surprised at Crookshanks' reaction. He purred to assure her that he wasn't.

"I'm not mad at myself. Why?"

The cat jumped from her lap and pranced to the wedding photograph of Hermione and Ron, excitedly waving and laughing, as sparks from their guests' wands rained down on them.

"I see," said Hermione, "it's because we both know I still love Ron."

She picked up the cat and rubbed her face against its scratchy tawny coat. "What's he doing now? Can you show me?"

She suddenly had a clear picture of Ron, with his work done and his prey in jail, lying in a hotel bed and snoring loudly. Hermione grinned lovingly at the image then whispered, "and, what about…him? What's he doing?"

Crookshanks let out an angry hiss and jumped far from Hermione, looking back at her with disgust.

"Alright, you don't have to make such a fuss about it," she yelled to the affronted cat. "I was just curious."

Swimming in her expanded bathtub again, Hermione had an epiphany, "That must be what makes it something I can live with…making sure I keep Ron first in my heart and mind."

She anxiously awaited his return the next evening. When he opened the door of their apartment, she ran to greet him. A surprised Ron responded to her soft, deep kisses enthusiastically.

"Can you send a message to Harry that we want to be alone tonight?" she asked him.

He nodded, as he kissed her again and began fondling her through the light gown she was wearing.

"I'll wait for you," she said, leaving him to his task.

He grabbed her and pulled her back next to him. "No," he said determinedly, "stay with me. I'm not losing you or that look," he added, gazing at her and her dreamy brown eyes.

He carried her into the bedroom and continued kissing and touching her, his desire mounting. Ron had always taken his cues from Hermione's reactions but now seemed to be engrossed in what he was doing and his own pleasure.

Hermione realized she liked his being a little less attentive and more focused, not sacrificing what he wanted to her whims.

She didn't scream the way she had with Scabior, but it was still the most satisfying experience she and Ron had ever had together.

"Ah, Hermione," he sighed deeply, still lying on top of her, "you've made me a very happy man. You did miss me, didn't you?"

She giggled. "Could you tell?"

He grinned and rolled to lie next to her, cuddling her against him. "Did you find a book?"

"What?"

"My girl always looks to a book when there's a problem. You found a book for us, my fantastic, clever girl," he said happily.

Hermione hesitated then, with forced brightness said, "Well, I've always done the homework for the both of us".

"Mmmm, I like this a lot better than trying to copy your potions notes," he said in a slow, raspy voice.

He wrapped his arms around her and pulled her on top of him. He stared up at her delicate face.

"What?" she asked, as his expression went from intense to playful.

"I'm trying to decide if I'm going to let you sleep at all tonight," he explained, "definitely not right now though" he said, as he pulled her head down so he could nuzzle her neck and help her clear her mind of latent thoughts for anyone else.

Over the next few days they were as happy as they'd ever been. If Hermione wasn't quite as sated physically as she'd been with Scabior, her slight itch was offset by her happiness in Ron's obvious delight and renewed sense of manhood.

On Friday night he suddenly jumped out of bed and exclaimed, "Let's go".

"Where?"

"Anywhere," he said, "that I can show you off…have people thinking 'lucky bloke…what must he be able to do to keep her happy'."

She grinned at him, as she inched over on her knees to the edge of the bed.

Ron's face lit up with an idea. "We'll go to muggle-land, London…find an outdoor café, eat their vile food, then walk around doing sneaky magic. Does that sound like fun?"

She loved his mischievous expression. She ran her fingers through his red hair, as he lifted her off of the bed and walked her over to the closet. "That does sound fun," she said.

"Damn right it does," he said confidently. "You put on a little dress that shows everyone just how lucky I am, and I'll dress to make you proud of me too."

"Oh, Ronald," she said breathily, "I am proud of you; I love you".

He looked down on her so happily and lovingly that his blue eyes glistened.

He left her to get ready. She hummed as she dressed and put on some makeup. Crookshanks crept along after her, purring approvingly.

She found Ron in the living room, wearing slacks and a light sport coat. He stepped into the unlit fireplace and held out his hand for her. "We'll go to the Leaky Cauldron first and exchange some gold for muggle money, then through the portal to London."

She nodded and stood in his arms, as he threw down a pinch of floo powder, called their destination, and lowered his head to kiss her.

"Break it up, you two. We don't need a fire in there," Neville chided good-naturedly, as the couple suddenly appeared at the inn, still lip-locked.

The place had been transformed under the management of Neville's fiancée, Hannah Abbott, into something more like a cool coffee house, with small tables scattered around, light wood floors and a subdued yellow on the walls. Plants flourished everywhere, receiving expert care from Neville. The ceiling was a large square of light, which the wizards could adjust individually to suit themselves. The aroma was no longer musty but exotic from all of the coffee and tea blends Hannah created.

"Can you blame me?" Ron asked the room at large. Hermione marveled in his new confidence and swagger.

They stepped out of the hearth and walked over to the cash register, with Ron detailing their plans to Neville. "I got the best the muggles had to offer and I want to show them she's in good hands," he said, putting his arm around Hermione, who stood to his left.

"Nice, Weasley," said Scabior to himself, sitting on the far right and a good distance behind them. "She does look beautiful tonight, with that dress showing her back, except it looks like there's tension in that shoulder again."

He darkened the ceiling over him so that he was sitting in shadow, then curled his fingers and whispered, "Masseo".

Hermione rolled her shoulder and looked around her. "Gareth," she thought to herself anxiously.

He watched her neck stretch and head turn, entranced by the elegance of her profile. He stayed out of her vision and enjoyed her reaction to his vicarious touch. "She still wants me," he said to himself, "she still needs me."

He decided to put into effect the plan he'd been mulling over as soon as he returned to Hogwarts. "Good thing she likes me."

_(Hint: He's not talking about Hermione)_


	5. Impressions

She woke in the middle of the night, feeling the touch again. "Gareth," she whispered with anticipation, sitting up in bed. Ron snored contentedly next to her; Crookshanks hissed at her. She sighed and fell back on her pillow.

For the rest of the weekend, Hermione continued the renewed honeymoon period with Ron but found her thoughts wandering to the rugged former Snatcher with greater frequency. On Sunday night she dreamt of him and moaned sensuously in her sleep.

Ron heard her and chuckled lightly. He placed an arm around her and said, "No more tonight, my veela, let me sleep." He kissed her cheek and promised as he snuggled closer, "I'll take care of you in the morning".

Hermione lay on her side in her spouse's embrace, planning how she might manage to see Scabior again, now that he was at Hogwarts, a place she couldn't enter without making her presence known.

…the Shrieking Shack….the Room of Requirement…definitely not Hogsmeade. It would be easier to see him if he had actually gone to America.

Across the dark room, Crookshanks' eyes glowed sternly, neon green points of accusation. She closed her eyes to block out the feline embodiment of her conscience.

Ron did, indeed, "take care" of her in the morning before they went to work. But it didn't calm her restless mind and body.

In her office she stared at the empty glass in front of her and slowly raised the hand gripping it…until it shattered again. "Reparo," she said for the fifth time, pointing her wand at the pieces of glass in frustration.

Suddenly the desk photograph of Genevieve Wray, muggle-born former headmistress of Hogwarts and one of Hermione's role models, announced to her, "Expect a visit in the next hour from Hogwarts' current headmistress, the venerable Professor Minerva McGonagall."

"Professor McGonagall? What does she want with me?" wondered Hermione.

She quickly finished her paperwork and tidied her work area. She had painted the room a pastel blue. Her desk was utilitarian oak but she had a very comfortable sofa in a blue and yellow floral pattern. She fluffed the pillows decorating it, and then decided it was too fussy for practical, no-nonsense McGonagall. She made the cushions disappear, just as her former mentor appeared before her.

"Professor, it's so good to see you. Please have a seat," Hermione invited, grasping the older woman's hands in welcome.

"Mrs. Weasley," said the tall, formidable headmistress, placing her pointed hat over Genevieve's portrait and seating herself stiffly on the sofa, "I've come to inform you that I have made arrangements for your free access from the back gate at Hogwarts into the Forbidden Forest."

"I beg your pardon," Hermione said with confusion.

The professor shifted uncomfortably. She'd hoped for this conversation to be as tacit as possible, without discussion of the specifics. Still, this was a long-delayed debt to pay and if this was how he chose to settle it…

"May I offer you some tea?" asked Hermione, sitting next to McGonagall and reaching for the teapot on the table at her side.

"No thank you," McGonagall said shortly. "Miss Granger, I mean Mrs. Weasley…"

"Hermione, please," said the younger woman.

"Very well, Hermione. A friend of yours has requested that you be permitted informal entry to the Forbidden Forest, where he's established residence. I have made the necessary accommodations for that. All you will need to do is present yourself at the rear gate and submit your wand for verification. You may then apparate directly to where he is."

Hermione looked down embarrassed, as she realized what McGonagall meant. "I don't understand, Professor," she said shyly.

"Oh don't feign ignorance, Hermione," the professor said, becoming impatient, "it doesn't become you. Mr. Scabior has confided in me the nature of your…association…and requested assistance in facilitating your meetings. I have fulfilled that request."

Her tone helped to embolden Hermione. "Thank you, Professor, I appreciate your efforts. If I choose to avail myself of your…hospitality, it is a relief to know that there is no question of your prudence."

McGonagall saw her former prized pupil in a new light, as the subtle suggestion of Hermione's words—that she was young and fresh and enjoying an exciting relationship, while her teacher was old and possibly prudish, in addition to prudent—impressed on her. "Of course," she said. "You interest me, Hermione."

"Because I'm having an affair?" Hermione interjected with irony.

It was the first time that she had voiced that reality, even to herself. It was like crossing a bridge that was collapsing behind her. And in saying it, she understood how common her actions were. Though her situation seemed so unique and special to her because it was so uncharacteristic of her, others would see it as base and shameful.

Professor McGonagall continued to eye her. "Don't be silly," she answered, "though it does show you to be a bit less inhibited than I've always thought you. What I find intriguing is your choice of partner and his choice of you."

"You know Gareth?" Hermione couldn't keep the smitten breathiness out of her voice.

"I knew him when he was a student at Hogwarts, though he wasn't in my house."

"He was in Slytherin," Hermione said confidently but a little subdued.

"Do you know that for a fact, dear?" asked McGonagall.

"No," Hermione answered.

"Then you shouldn't assume," the professor said definitively.

"Of course," Hermione said, "but he became a Death Eater…"

McGonagall sighed. "Yes, his actions during the war were some of the most disappointing, though perhaps shouldn't have been unexpected, considering his feelings about school and house politics".

Hermione looked puzzled. McGonagall smiled slightly. "I've said enough. You might ask Mr. Scabior if you wish to know more. I've heard good things about your work here, Hermione. People are optimistic that you can help restore the Ministry to its former prestige, possibly one day become Minister yourself."

"Thank you," Hermione responded humbly.

"A group of us witches meet monthly to discuss issues and the welfare of the wizarding community. Perhaps you would like to join us," offered McGonagall.

The younger woman nearly spilled the tea she was pouring. Professor McGonagall was inviting her to join her coven, the most influential group of witches in the Hogwarts sphere.

"Thank you, Ma'am," Hermione said again, flattered. "I appreciate the invitation."

"Well, we need new voices and members," the professor said, rising from the couch and removing her hat from the desk to uncover a miffed Genevieve, "young and ambitious, with surprising facets. I'll notify you of our next date and location."

Just before she left, Hermione called out to her, "Professor McGonagall, the arrangements you mentioned earlier…did you say they're already in place?"

"Yes, Hermione," McGonagall said tolerantly, "you may visit at your convenience."

She disappeared.

Hermione excitedly worked her way through her assignments, clearing her afternoon.

She disapparated from her office to the back gate at Hogwarts then into the Forbidden Forest.

"Are you lost?" Scabior asked teasingly when she appeared before him.

"No," she said with a big smile as she wrapped her arms around him, "I'm exactly where I want to be".


	6. Forbidden

Exactly where Hermione wanted to be was with Scabior—in the glass-enclosed, leafy retreat that he'd created in the center of a copse of evergreens. She wasn't really aware of her surroundings until she was bodily sated, then looked around in wonder.

"It's perfect," she said dreamily, looking up at the sun shining through the clear roof. She instinctively whispered, because the insulation from the trees and remoteness of the setting made a quiet she didn't want to disturb with a normal voice. This wasn't a place for normalcy.

"I'm glad you like it," Scabior said, walking back to the bed, where she lay comfortably. He carried a bowl of fruit for them to share. She raised up to grab some grapes. "I thought of you when I made it," he added, sitting next to her and kissing her bare, pale shoulder.

She pushed him down on the bed and rested her head on his muscular chest. "Why do I feel so good with you?"

He lightly rubbed her arms and back and explained the universal appeal of an extra-marital affair, that had trapped people for thousands of years. "We do good things together," he began, "we make each other happy then don't have to argue about paying the bills or household chores…who's getting up with the baby in the middle of the night".

She raised her head to look thoughtfully in his dark brown eyes. A little wistfully he concluded, "For us it will always be better than and not as good as a real couple".

She lowered her eyes, as she began to think of her real relationship, complete with the arguments, with Ron.

"There's only one world where we can be allowed to stay happy together," he said with a sigh. "Would you like to see us in that world?" He suddenly rose to get off of the bed and put on a pair of pants.

"What?"

He handed her the Ministry robe and held out his hand. "Come with me," he said excitedly.

He seemed to walk through the glass wall at the front of the room and into the surrounding trees. Hermione followed, throwing on the robe. He whistled and a giant golden palomino horse appeared and knelt in front of him.

Scabior picked up Hermione and placed her on the horse's wide back then climbed up behind her. The horse stood and began moving deeper into the forest.

"Where are we going?" Hermione asked, curious but not anxious to arrive at a destination any time soon. She loved the feeling of Scabior pressed against her, the scratch of the horse's hair on her bare legs, the changing scenery and smells, from the field flowers in an unexpected sunny glen, to the earthy aromas of a dark marsh.

"You'll see," he answered teasingly. "It's a good distance and we have to be very quiet when we get there, so talk to me now".

There was a question Hermione had been dying to ask him. "Professor McGonagall said something about your feeling for school politics. What was she talking about?"

Gareth exhaled heavily then placed his arms across the top of Hermione's chest, like a soft, cuddly choke hold, as if he were afraid what he said might make her leave him. "How can a shining star of Gryffindor understand?" he said pensively.

"What house were you in?"

"Hufflepuff"

"Really?" That didn't fit at all with the small amount she knew of his past and what she knew of the most docile, unassuming house at Hogwarts.

She could feel his low chuckle against her back. "That's the image my housemates and me hoped to change," he said. "Do you know yet that house assignment can affect your future, your standing in the world, even your earning potential?"

"No," she said. Now that she thought about it though, her co-workers were mostly Gryffindor and Ravenclaw alumni and the majority of their support staff were from Hufflepuff. The supervisors who delegated responsibility then took credit for the work of others were largely Slytherin.

"I was destined for H House—that's what we called it," Scabior explained. "I'm actually a descendant of Helga's. But I didn't want to take orders from someone all of my life, just because of the judgment of a damned talking hat. My friends and I wanted to show that Hufflepuff not only meant loyalty, but could also be dynamic and brave and accomplished." His tone changed to resentful as he said, "Dumbledore couldn't have that".

"Dumbledore?" Hermione's voice took on the reverential quality it always did when she mentioned the brilliant, former headmaster. "What did he do?"

"What didn't he do?" said Scabior with an audible sneer. He cancelled quidditch matches when he knew we would win, he'd wait until the end of term when it was clear we would get House Cup then dump huge numbers of points on Gryffindor, he undermined us every step of the way for his own precious house."

"But Gareth, it was important that Gryffindor be on top so when Harry came, he could be groomed to defeat Voldemort."

Scabior dropped his arms and sighed deeply. "I know that now. But no one did then, not even Professor McGonagall. She argued with him all the time about how unfair he was being to the other houses, especially Hufflepuff."

Hermione looked back into his face, then away. She saw a hint of the Snatcher who had been willing to work with a bloodthirsty werewolf. "So what happened to you?"

"My family died. I was miserable and resentful and when I needed a strong house to support me, Dumbledore fired our faculty head, Professor Burns."

"Burns?" Hermione was conversant in Hogwarts history but had never heard that name in connection with the school.

"Yes," Scabior said. "He's the one who encouraged us to beat the other houses, including Gryffindor. After he left, I lost control. I went after Dumbledore in the Great Hall in front of everyone."

"Oh," said Hermione in a small voice.

"McGonagall told him he should be lenient with me because I was…lost. But he decided to make an example of me instead and expelled me."

Hermione was quiet, absorbing this unimagined story. "Professor McGonagall really liked you?"

"Well, she liked Professor Burns. And he really liked me. No one has any idea what happened between him and Dumbledore. But his name was expunged from the school's records. You know my community mentor is Aberforth. He said he remembers his brother from around that time being different than he'd ever been before, or since. He guesses it might have had to do with Harry Potter's situation, but no one knows."

Hermione thought of how irrational Dumbledore's actions were, as though he'd been guided by something other than his brain, and remembered what Harry had told her about that man's history with Gellert Grindlewald…hmmm.

"And after that…"

"…it went from bad to worse," he confirmed, "ending in Azkaban. That place and the dementors drained me of my humanity."

He grasped her tightly. "I started getting it back the first time I held you, even if it was as a prisoner. You were the softest, sweetest thing I'd ever had in my arms. I began to think of how I could be good enough that you would want me to hold you.

She turned her face toward him and he leaned closer to her. "You've restored my humanity," he said, kissing her softly. He then whispered, "We're almost there. We'll have to be very quiet now."

He stopped the horse and slid down from its back then held out his arms for Hermione. "Shhh," he said, carrying her on tiptoe to the edge of a large knoll. They looked over it and saw a scruffy little faun with black hair. The small male was darting around on his hoofed legs, gathering nuts and flowers in his arms.

Hermione watched breathlessly, as he carried his offerings to the bottom of a large tree and bestowed them on an angelic-looking, maple-haired wood nymph. She smiled at her suitor and gave him a kiss on his cheek.

Scabior continued whispering in Hermione's ear. "See, for everyone else, he's nothing but trouble. But for her, there's nothing he wouldn't do."

The magical creatures held hands and hurried from the shadowy trees into a bright meadow.

"She knows how to give him just enough to keep him wanting more," Scabior continued his commentary in Hermione's ear. "She starts out teasing, but she loves his attention to her. Her family keeps calling her back, but she doesn't want to leave him."

They watched the tiny lovers frolic and laugh until the nymph reluctantly flew back to her place in the roots of the tree.

"Look at her wings," Scabior said, still whispering. "They were singed in the sun. She can't stay there with him long. They both know that, but take whatever time they can together."

"That's so sad; she loves the sun," Hermione whispered.

"Yes, but little Rose belongs in the security of the tree, not in the open meadow with the wild boy who loves her," Gareth said quietly, laying Hermione on the soft mossy ground and opening her robe.

They kissed passionately, maintaining their silence. The faun and wood nymph sat secretly on a low branch, holding hands and watching the humans in fascination.

Hermione pointed her wand and mouthed "Prophylla". The need for quiet forced her to control and concentrate the pleasure she felt in the joining of Hufflepuff and Gryffindor, snatcher and prey, Gareth and Hermione.

He looked down at her face, flush in silent ecstasy. To himself he said "Preservo", not wanting to trust this experience to the inconsistency of memory. That was an expression and this was a moment he never wanted to forget.


	7. Turned a Corner

_**a/n This chapter marks the change from T to M. I hope I don't lose many readers but since it was already mature subject matter anyway, maybe not. I told one reader that my challenge would be to make Ron a worthy adversary to Scabior as a lover for Hermione. So we have fun, temper, vulnerability, sex, romance and history in my longest chapter yet. To those who might say this is out of character for them, the canon didn't show them at this age. As repressed as Hermione was when she was younger, this is actually a pretty likely scenario and you can only hope that all Ron needed was a little encouragement to bring out a real romantic. Please let me know what you think**_

Hermione popped back into her office, still tingly from her time with Scabior.

"There you are," said Ron from behind her desk. She turned to him in surprise, as he walked around the desk to hug her.

"Ron, what are you doing here?" she asked a little breathlessly and nervously, thankful that she'd cast her cleansing charm before leaving the forest.

"I came to get you," he said, bestowing small kisses across her face. "Ginny's in town, so we're meeting her and Harry at his place for dinner."

Ginny? She couldn't face Ginny. She would know…something. Hermione looked at Ron with worry.

"Is there something wrong?" he asked.

"So the three of you decided for me what I'm doing tonight, is that it?" Hermione's voice was angry.

"No one could reach you," Ron responded, reacting to her tone. "Where have you been anyway?"

She pushed away from him. "I don't like having situations or people forced on me," she said coldly. "This is just like you, Ronald, thinking you know how I feel."

Ron's irritation matched hers. "Well, I won't tell my sister and supposedly your best friend that you don't want her 'forced' on you. I'll just let them know we're not coming."

He headed toward the door then stopped. "On second thought, I'll let them know you're not coming. I'd rather be with them right now than with you."

Hermione gasped. This wasn't what she'd wanted. She stared at him. He wore his red hair shorter now and he worked out a lot so his muscles were long and hard, not bunchy-looking. His face was more mature and angular but the lips were still full and inviting. The look he gave her now wasn't anger, but disappointment and hurt. She felt awful for what she'd said, yet she'd never been more attracted to him.

"You're right," he said, shrugging his shoulders and turning the palms of his hands out in a sign of resignation, "I don't know how you feel. I thought we were beginning to learn that about each other but….nothing's changed."

Hermione hurried to him and grabbed the front of his ministry robe. "I'm so sorry, Ron. I don't know what I was saying."

He lowered his eyes but didn't attempt to get away from her.

"Please don't be angry with me," she continued, tentatively touching his face. "Of course I want to see Ginny. More importantly, I don't want to be away from you. I love you. Do you forgive me?"

Ron looked into the soft, brown eyes that had largely dictated his emotions for more than ten years. He kissed her lightly. "Yeah, I forgive you. I don't want to be mad at you."

He pulled her into his arms and laid her head against his chest. "I feel like we've turned a corner and I don't ever want to go back to the way things were before. We're better with each other now, aren't we?"

She nodded and raised her head. "Yes, we really are." She knew the key to a successful lie was to tell as much of the truth as possible. "I was just upset. I was supposed to meet someone and he didn't show."

"Gareth?"

Hermione had returned her head to rest against him. It shot up when he said that name. "What?"

"I saw the name scribbled on a piece of parchment on your desk when I was going to write a note to you. What is he, an informant?"

"Something like that," she answered carefully.

He looked at her and brushed some hair from her eyes. "Well, if he'd ever seen you, he would've shown up," he said, lowering his head to kiss her again…and again, becoming more intense.

He inched her over to the sofa against the wall closest to them and lay on top of her, as he continued randomly kissing her.

"Ron?"

"Hmm?"

"Are you seducing me on my office sofa?"

He snickered with his lips still pressed against her neck. "Anytime, anywhere…that's my new philosophy. Get used to it." He looked down at her. "But not here and now…I have something else in mind." He stood up and held out his arms for her. "Come on, we're going shopping."

"Shopping," she said with a note of surprise, "for what?"

He grabbed her hands and pulled her off of the sofa. "I'm going to buy you a dress," he said mischievously.

She giggled. "That's silly; I don't need a new dress. And after the way I just acted, I certainly don't deserve one."

"Don't spoil this for me, Hermione. I'm looking forward to it." He leaned his forehead against her and said raspily, "And if you're worried about not deserving it, you'll earn it before the end of the night."

She blushed a little. Grinning down on her, he said, "Now, take us to your favorite store".

"Amortentia," she said, as his lips came down on hers.

"Ahem," said the sales clerk when they appeared in the dress shop.

Ron reluctantly disengaged his mouth from Hermione's then turned her around so she was facing the saleswoman but still in his arms. "What do you have to make this more beautiful?" he asked in a low, near-monotone voice.

The sales clerk lowered her cat's eyes red glasses and quickly scanned Hermione. "I'll see what I can find," she said, walking away.

Ron nuzzled Hermione's neck and kneaded her skin through her robe. "Ron, they're staring at us," she whispered.

He looked up and saw a couple of teenage witches, watching them with sustained interest. He winked at them. They tittered and turned away.

"See, they're not staring," he said cockily. He kissed her cheek then tore himself away from her to walk around the store. The décor was primarily black with pastel colors. The clothes were arranged by theme, rather than size, as the witches could choose the style they wanted then adjust it to fit.

"So this is Amortentia," he said, selecting a hanger from a rack and holding its lacy, light blue bra against his chest.

Hermione smiled at him. He returned the hanger to the rack and asked, "Does it smell different to everyone who comes here, like the potion does?"

"That's the idea," Hermione confirmed. "It's like a challenge to come here and not get more than you want when the scent is playing with your mind like that. What does it smell like to you?"

"You, of course," he answered, coming back to her embrace. "I'm engulfed in au de Hermione and I like it. How about you?"

She raised her hands to his head and lowered it to bury her face in the bright locks. "Your hair…I love the way it smells".

"Anything else," he coaxed her, rubbing his head on her shoulder.

"Hmmm," she said without thinking, "deep, dark woods, maybe a bit of the ocean".

He raised his head to look at her quizzically. Her nervousness from earlier returned, as she realized what she'd said. Ron smiled. "You're a complex woman, my veela."

He kissed her again and the sales clerk returned with four or five dresses. "It's like she waits for me to kiss you to show up," he whispered in mock irritation.

Hermione giggled again and turned her attention to the dresses. Ron resumed his position, pressed against her back, with his arms around her.

She exclaimed over a couple of the choices but he shook his head so that she felt it against her own. "No, not hot enough," he said when the clerk had presented the last one. "I want something that shows off this neck (he nibbled it) these shoulders (he kissed one) and these legs (he rubbed her thighs through the robe).

"Very well," the clerk said with a sigh, "I'll try again".

"I have faith in you," Ron said to her flirtily, as she walked away. She threw him a smile over her shoulder.

"Show off my neck, shoulders and legs…why don't I just go naked?"

Ron snickered. "Fine with me, though Harry would never be the same again".

Hermione shook her head with a tolerant, amused smile.

The clerk returned triumphant with the perfect dress.

"Great," Ron said, "let's go try it on you". He led her by the hand to the changing rooms, not even stopping in the seating area where wizards usually waited.

He took off his robe and stuffed it into his expanded wallet, standard issue for aurors, then with his wand performed the cloaking enchantments they'd all perfected during their time on the lam.

"What are you doing?" Hermione asked. He put a finger to his lips as he touched his wand to each of the mirrors covering the walls of the small room.

"I've heard that a lot of women don't like these mirrored rooms," he said to Hermione's astonishment (when and where would he have heard that?) "But they don't look as good from every angle as you do," he concluded, coming to her.

He removed her robe and the blouse beneath it. Hermione pulled down her slacks. He ran his lips lightly down the length of her spine, slowly dropping to his knees and sliding her knickers down with him.

Hermione's legs quivered slightly as he kissed the top of her buttocks then turned her around.

"Ron?"

"Hmm?"

"Are you seducing me in the changing room of Amortentia?"

He chuckled, lifting her leg over his shoulder. "You always were the brightest witch," he said, kissing the inside of her thigh and moving inward. She gasped.

"Alright there?" he asked, looking up at her. She moistened her lips and nodded. He smiled and resumed his exploration.

Hermione leaned back her head and closed her eyes. She slowly moved the leg over his shoulder back and forth, pushing herself closer against him. Her stiletto heel grazed his back, causing him to open his mouth wider and bite a little.

She'd never felt so many sensations at one. She was conscious of a change in the air, with the sandalwood from Ron's hair now dominating and ocean/woods scents receding.

She lowered her leg and stooped down to face him. His blue eyes seemed to bore through her and she responded with a look of curiosity and hunger.

_Really, Ron,_ she said to herself as she straddled him, _after all these years, can we be and do…everything for each other?_

She kissed him and tasted herself in his mouth. They began a perfect rhythm, as though everything they'd ever known about each other, every experience culminated in their motion.

She tremored but rather than stopping her action, it only spurred her to continue. "Ah," she exclaimed repeatedly, "Ron…"

"I know," he said through his heavy breathing, "me too. One…two…three…"

Hermione wasn't sure she could live through the simultaneous internal and external combustion, but gloriously did.

She laid her head on his shoulder, completely drained and breathing rapidly. He held her that way for a minute but when her panting didn't lessen, he laid her gently on the carpeted floor. "Are you alright?" he asked with concern.

She looked up at him, her breasts still heaving, but his light touch calming her a little. "Yes," she said quietly, "Ron…"

He grinned and kissed her. "Anytime, anywhere…I'm going to pay for your dress while you put it on and…do something with your hair," he said amusedly, lifting one of her damp, straggly tresses.

She watched as he rose, pulled on his pants and ran his hands through his hair and looked…great. He tapped his wand on the mirrors again, capturing the multi-camera video he'd created with them, and then leaned over her again. "My veela," he said lovingly.

He left the room and Hermione stared up at the ceiling for a minute. "Turned a corner, my ass," she said out loud. This was more like barreling down a highway, slamming on the emergency brake and spinning madly. And this after her time with Gareth…She touched her arms, legs, face, everywhere, reclaiming her body from the two men.

She slowly rose to her feet and slipped on the new dress, snapped her hair into a bushy ponytail and recited "Reparo" over her face to re-do her makeup.

The clerk was laughing with Ron, as Hermione re-entered the main room. She leaned against his back and wrapped her arms around him. He turned around and looked at her appreciatively. "Well, if everyone left your store looking this good, your business would double."

The clerk smiled. "You look wonderful together. Enjoy your evening. Come again." He snickered at her unwitting joke.

The couple strolled up Diagon Alley holding hands. In the Leaky Cauldron they exchanged pleasantries with Neville and Hannah then went through the portal into London.

Hermione prepared to apparate but Ron stopped her and instead hailed a cab.

"Where to?" said the young woman driver, as they climbed into the back seat. Ron gave the Grimmauld Place address, as he positioned Hermione across his lap.

He held her close and looked at her a moment before speaking. "I've always loved you, even when I teased you, or complained about your showing off with your spells, or when you were irritated with me. I waited for those times when you showed me you really cared—like when Padfoot bit my leg. You were so sweet and concerned. I couldn't help thinking if only you'd let me hold you and kiss you and you touched me, I'd feel no pain."

"Ron, you were 13 then!"

He shrugged and lifted her hand to kiss it then rubbed it against his bristly jaw.

"I guess I was older when I had those feelings," Hermione said. The first time I actively desired you was when you were poisoned, remember?"

"Vaguely," he said ironically.

She smiled at him. "You said my name in your sleep and…"

"I did?"

She looked surprised. "Didn't I ever tell you?"

"No," he answered. They looked at each other, realizing how much they'd missed in their life together.

"Well, you did," she continued. "Poor Lavender ran out broken-hearted and everyone else left us alone. I sat and held your hand but kept wondering 'If I took off my clothes and climbed into bed with him, would he like that?'"

"Yeah," Ron answered immediately, "he would. What do you think I was dreaming about when I said your name?" He pulled her to him. "Awh, I wish we would've done something about it then. We wasted another year…"

"We were a little busy then," she reminded him, leaning back in his arms, "helping Harry save the world, looking for horcruxes…"

"…running from Snatchers," Ron added.

She tensed but hoped he didn't notice. He didn't.

"…me leaving you like a bloody idiot…"

She put her arms around his neck. "I missed you terribly then; I regretted…"

He grinned. "Did it make you wish that you'd crawled into my bed when we had the chance?" She nodded.

His expression became serious as he said, "I wanted you so bad. It would have been so much better for us. No horcrux could've been stronger than we would've been together."

"Grimmauld Place," said the driver. Ron placed the money for the fare and generous tip in her hand, jangling some of her bracelets as he did so. "Keep the change," he told her.

He and Hermione then stood in front of the building, waiting for the woman to leave so that they could perform the spell to reveal the entrance to the Black ancestral home where Harry now lived.

The driver, however, was fascinated with them. _Weird,_ she said to herself. Almost everything they said seemed to be some kind of code…snatchers, horcruxes, spells. Still, they were sweet and hot together.

She finally drove away. From her rearview mirror she saw the cute redhead take some long sticks out of his back pocket and hand one to the pretty young woman. They stood with their arms around each other and seemed to point their sticks at the building. "Weird," she said as she turned a corner into another street, "but hot".


	8. Anytime, anywhere

Kreacher opened the door of the Grimmauld Place house and greeted the young couple warmly. "Mister Weasley, Miss Hermione, it's such a pleasure to see you again." He wore pants and a tiny dinner jacket.

Hermione stooped to give him a quick hug. He returned the gesture with a little embarrassment. He cleared his throat and said formally, "If you'll follow me, please, Mister Potter and Miss Weasley are in the kitchen."

Harry had redecorated the house, mostly in the bio-chromatic scheme of black and white favored by young men, particularly bachelors. As a lark, though, he'd kept the long hallway leading from the front door to the kitchen dark and foreboding, as it had been when the four of them first stayed there, along with the rest of Ron's family, as caretakers of headquarters for the Order of the Phoenix.

"…the kitchen," Kreacher repeated slowly, coming to a stop. He walked around in a circle with his head down, then back the way from which they'd come.

Ron pulled Hermione close during that exhibition and bent her back a little, feverishly kissing her neck and top of her chest.

The mischievous grey eyes across the hall glowed in the dark and watched approvingly.

"Is Kreacher alright?" Hermione asked, her concern for the elf tempered by her enjoyment in Ron's actions.

"He's fine," Ron assured her, continuing his kissing and nuzzling, "a little confundus never hurt anyone."

The grey eyes sparked with silent amusement.

"You confunded Kreacher?" He nodded against her neck. "Why?"

Ron raised her to an upright position and held her against him, as his hand traveled the length of her back, across her bum and then under her skirt. "What do you want?" he asked her, "Kreacher to formally announce us so we can begin hours of pleasant conversation, or do you want a little of that time alone together in one of the hundreds of rooms up there," he finished, inclining his head in the direction of the upper floors.

Ron's blue eyes and those across the hall watched Hermione's face, waiting for the answer. "I'll take Option B," she responded, placing her partially-opened mouth on Ron's for a deep, preliminary kiss. They groped each other for a couple of minutes and the grey eyes crinkled with a big smile.

The owner of the eyes and smile thoroughly enjoyed his silent voyeurism. _T__hey're not going to make it upstairs._

Ron and Hermione backed into a wall and suddenly heard a commanding voice, "Stop that! Stop it at once…oh, the effrontery, carrying on in that manner in public!"

Ron pulled out his deluminator and lit the hallway to reveal the outraged Phineas Nigellus Black in his portrait on the wall, against which Ron had Hermione pinned.

"I beg your pardon, Sir," Ron said with exaggerated politeness, "but we're the only people here in what was a dark hall, so most wouldn't consider it public. But even if it were, I'll kiss my wife anytime, anywhere I like…that she likes," he added as an afterthought, earning a soft, slow kiss on the back of his neck.

"Congratulations, Weasley," said the hearty voice across the hall. Ron turned with his arm around Hermione's shoulders and saw the smiling portrait of the grey-eyed Sirius Black. "Hey, Sirius, Harry said he was getting a portrait of you. You've never looked better."

"I could say the same for you," Sirius responded. "And you, Hermione," he said, appraising her with a practiced eye, "you are gorgeous." Ron squeezed her shoulders proudly with a smarmy grin. "You definitely have that newly-wed glow," Sirius added with a broad wink. "Good show, Ron".

Hermione saw the look that passed between the two men and, pretending offense, said, "I would just like to point out that I'm not the only one who's glowing. Ron seems to be a well-satisfied man, wouldn't you say?"

"Whatever are you talking about?" asked Phineas from his portrait behind them. Hermione looked back over her shoulder and whispered, "Sex, professor." Phineas harrumphed dramatically.

"Hah Haaah," Sirius continued with delight, "You, my young friend, are a very lucky man. But you'd better hurry if you want to get upstairs before the 'people' know you're here."

The couple headed toward the staircase. "Oh, Ron," Sirius called and Ron turned his head. "In the room at the top of the third floor landing is a table with a false top. My mother's jewels are in it. There's a diamond choker that would be perfect for Hermione—a wedding gift from the Black family."

"Thanks, Sirius," Ron said, now bounding up the stairs, grabbing at Hermione's ass.

Sirius watched as far as he could. The kitchen door opened and Harry stepped into the hallway and asked, "Was that Ron I heard just now?"

"Ron?" Sirius said as though surprised, "no. I haven't seen him".

Harry sighed in exasperation. "They're late and Ginny's getting angry".

_Imagine that_, Sirius thought to himself sarcastically. To Harry he said, "I'll send them in there as soon as I see them."

Harry retreated to the kitchen and closed the door, just before the sound from upstairs of a door being repeatedly shaken in its frame, accompanied by noises from the lovers, began.

Sirius shook his head, this time with envy and a little frustration. "Seeing and hearing those two gets my juices going again. It's been soooo long." He was quiet for a moment then asked Phineas, "Is that painting of the buxom milkmaid still in that other room on the third floor?"

"Sirius, you can't do that," said his great-great grandfather, scandalized. "She's an ancestor."

"How far back?" Sirius asked, dangling from the top of his portrait, having already begun his climb to the third floor.

"Ten generations."

Sirius considered briefly and said with a chuckle, "Yeah, I can do that." He disappeared from the frame. Seconds later the coat he was wearing dropped to the bottom.

"The idea," said the prudish patriarch, left alone in the hallway.

Harry poked his head out the door again. "Have you seen Ron and Hermione yet?"

"Who, the redhead and his young woman?" asked Phineas.

"Yes," said Harry.

Phineas smiled conspiratorially, "No."

Harry shook his head in exasperation and turned back, speaking to someone in the kitchen "Alright, alright. If they're not here in..."

The door slammed behind him and Phineas snickered.

On the second floor the unfashionably late pair had moved from the door to a bed to catch their breath, and were lying side by side. Ron looked into Hermione's eyes for a minute. He had this idea. It was so impulsive, she'd never go along with it, but he hoped desperately that she would.

"I've been thinking about what we talked about in the cab," he began softly, touching her shoulder and arm, "about how much time we missed. It's like we always had all that sexual tension between us and didn't know what to do with it."

"So we fought," Hermione chimed in, "and became more unsure of each other and ourselves all the time. I guess some of those bad habits spilled over into the marriage."

Ron sighed and said, "Well, I think we've stopped the spill now. We just need to clean it all up." He leaned toward her playfully, "I'll use my tongue to make sure I get all of it," he said, licking her from collarbone to jaw line. She shivered at the sensation. With his forehead resting on the side of her head, he said, "Those bad habits didn't make for much of a honeymoon."

"We had a really nice time, Ron," she protested.

"I'm not talking about a nice time," he said huskily. "I mean a honeymoon where we're naked most of the time and when we are in public, we can't keep our hands off of each other."

She gave him her full attention.

"I like being super-human with you in the Muggle world. I want us to go to Rome and make love in the Coliseum, the top of the Eiffel Tower in Paris, maybe in the Louvre. We could borrow the cloak from Harry," he coaxed.

"What are you saying?" she asked.

"I want us to go on a second honeymoon…tomorrow, before we can start planning and talk ourselves out of it. I want to do it right this time."

"Ron, we have—"

"—time saved up at work from when we returned early the first time, enough gold to be able to treat ourselves, and more love for each other than we did the first time," he said.

"But…"

He kissed her. "No buts…except for this one," he said putting his hands on her ass again. "I love you; we're going."

_So sweet,_ she thought. "I love you too," she said aloud, not quite able to keep the thought out of her mind, _but what about Gareth_? She covered that by sliding closer to him and dropping her head. "Alright," she said softly.

He smiled happily and kissed her shoulder then bounced off of the bed. "You rest. I'm going to find that necklace for you." Hermione had noticed lately that Ron was invigorated by sex, where it left her drained. _But I've had a lot more than he today,_ she reminded herself.

On the third floor Ron found the choker and went through the basic dark magic detection charms. Finding it clean, he was anxious to give it to Hermione.

As he walked out the door and closed it, he heard the tinkle of flirtatious laughter. He saw through an open door a large painting of a pretty blonde woman in a blue gingham dress, sitting on a milking stool and exposing a lot of leg, with a cow in the background. The primary-colored landscape suggested an idyllic country morning. Ron did a double-take as he noticed Sirius with the young woman.

"That's a very becoming dress," said the legendary Hogwarts ladies' man, "except that sleeve won't stay up for anything. Let me help you," he said, pulling the short, puffy sleeve back on the coquette's shoulder. "On second thought, maybe it does look better down," he said, sliding it a little lower than where he'd found it. The blonde tittered again and Sirius responded with, "ha haaa."

Ron gave a low whistle in admiration then hurried down the stairs to his own ideal woman. He put the necklace on her and she, refreshed from her short nap, asked, "How do I look?"

He grinned devilishly and said, "like you've been fucked twice in the last hour".

Hermione smiled and circled him with her arms, just above his hips. _Not to mention the three times before that_, she said to herself, equally devilishly, before mentally slapping herself. _Keep Ron first._ "Are we ready to be charming now?"

"I think you've been very charming," Ron said. "You charmed the pants right off of me."

They laughed together and walked downstairs holding hands. Ron collected the light in the hall in his deluminator, gave Hermione another small kiss and pinch, then they walked into the big kitchen where everyone was congregated.

"Sorry we're late….Muggle transportation. Hey, Neville, Hannah, Sis…Harry, there's something I want to talk to you about."


	9. The Spell

Gareth ran to burn off his frustration. He hadn't seen Hermione in two weeks. He hadn't touched a woman in two weeks, the longest he'd gone since he was 16. Oh, yeah…there was a lot of sex in Azkaban Prison and he'd sampled all of it—women, men, groups. Nothing, though, had ever felt as soft or sweetly resistant then yielding as Hermione Granger Weasley.

He jumped over a ravine and continued his sprint through the forest. Then again, would she still feel the same…if she ever came back to him, that is…after fuckin' the ginger all over Europe? He got regular reports on them from contacts in various locations…sickenin'.

He stopped to catch his breath. Wizards didn't usually run for exercise, but he, wandless yet powerful, wasn't a typical wizard. He flopped down on the ground with his back against a rock, more tired but no less tense, dissatisfied or disgusted.

He felt a little nudge on his back. He turned around and saw arched over the top of the rock a fairy, about six inches tall, with glowing black skin and hair, in the throes of masturbation. One of her legs was bent and the other spread wide. She had a tiny hand between them and one alternately fondled her breasts and buttocks. She looked up at Scabior as she scooped her lower torso forward and back, obviously on the cusp of the gratification he was lacking.

His grin was lascivious as he asked, "Enjoyin' yourself?" She nodded, her breath whispery and rapid. "Mind if I watch?" She shook her head no then turned onto her stomach and lifted her hips, continuing her action and looking at him over her shoulder.

"Perfect little ass," he said to himself, imagining the tiny figure as a full-grown nude.

She turned back around then and flew toward him, suspending herself in front of his face with the frank look that he would have no trouble understanding if she _were_ a full-grown nude. But what could this miniscule minx want?

She stared into his eyes so her thought could penetrate his brain, "Want Man".

He chuckled but wasn't able to take his eyes off of her. "How would that work?" he asked with a little mirth in his voice. "My erection is bigger than your whole, sweet little body."

She concentrated on the next statement to convey to him, her limbs stiff and fists clenched so her nails pushed into her palms.

"You say there's a spell that can make you woman-sized?" he asked for confirmation.

She nodded emphatically. He shook his head. "I don't believe it. If there were such a spell, every wizard would know it. It'd be passed down from father to son. Transformin' one of you beautiful creatures would be a rite of passage."

She sent another complicated message then trembled from the strain it had put on her. "Fairies not for passage. Magic ours, not wizards; we tell when we want man."

Scabior smirked, his dark brown eyes showing something other than displeasure for the first time in weeks. "Very smart…you'd never get any peace otherwise." She nodded and stared at him seductively, lowering her eyelids and parting her lips.

"Do you want to tell me, little beauty?" Again she nodded, now slowly circling her hips and moving closer, almost in contact with him.

He no longer smiled, entranced by the creature and the idea that this was possible. "Tell me," he said urgently, his eyes now smoldering.

She licked her lips and leaned forward. He could feel the feathery breeze of her breath between his eyes, as she transmitted the spell to him. "And what about the reversal?" he asked.

She raised her arms above her head, bringing her chest into prominence, as she smiled and told his brain, "Man not want reversal".

He matched her smile, saying "You're probably right, but it's part of the spell, isn't it? I need to know."

She reluctantly fed him that information. He carefully wrapped his fingers around her, conscious of her excited trembling. He placed her on the rock and began. She lifted one leg and he used his fingers to tug on it, from thigh to toes, as if stretching and priming her muscles. They repeated with the second leg then arms, with him repeating the incantation continuously, "Freya…Ferleia…Free". He performed the same action on her upper and lower body and face and her wings. He was pleasantly surprised that, rather than fragile, like those of a butterfly, they were more like thinner skin and pliable. They wouldn't be an impediment if this actually worked. She elicited tiny moans of pleasure throughout his ministrations.

Gareth became suspicious. If this horny, selfish little insect was making this up just so he'd touch her…

She had a quick intake of breath and suddenly before him lay nearly six feet of female perfection. She pulled Gareth's head down to her and pried his mouth open with her tongue, finding his and massaging his taste buds.

He returned her ardor and moved on top of her, no need for sheath commands or other delays, as he'd seen her preparations.

She locked her legs around him. He felt, rather than heard her excitement, since her vocal chords were the only part of her body not subject to the magic. She scratched his back and all but begged him to push harder, faster, more. She kissed him ferociously with her first orgasm and again when she joined him and he fell back in blissful relief.

She threw her leg over him and squeezed him happily, her month-long mission accomplished. He looked up into her face. "This wasn't a chance meeting, was it?" She shook her head no. "Did you plan this?" She nodded.

Gareth grinned and rolled to change positions with her. He looked down at her body and back to her face, dominated by rosy lips and black eyes with dark, thick lashes that curled and nearly met her eyebrows. "You're very clever aren't you?"

She smiled in answer. His fingers lightly traced her curves. "Are you the loveliest creature in the forest?" She nodded.

Scabior smiled and showed his dimples. Her breath caught a little at the sight. She loved seeing the happiness that she had brought to the beautiful man she'd desired and plotted to have for so long.

"Do you have a name?" he asked. She looked quizzical. He grinned again, absorbing her shiny, black, jewel-like beauty. "I'll call you Onyx. Do you like that?"

She nodded and smiled and lowered her head to his chest where she began slowly creating patterns with her nose and tongue. He dropped his head lower, to her breasts, and did the same. They played a silent "Anything You Can Do" until they'd reached a fever pitch for sensory-warping pleasure.

Afterwards he reluctantly performed the reversal while she pouted. He promised to see her again and suggested she bring a friend with her next time.

Running back home, he remembered that Hagrid had warned against becoming involved with any of the enticing woodland creatures but Gareth couldn't see the downside. And he wasn't Hagrid, who had probably never had to worry about any creature wanting to become involved with him. He, on the other hand, had been the principal occupation of literally the most beautiful thing that breathed in any forest. He was one of a very few wizards privileged to be given the fairy spell and he could create magic without a wand. "Who needs a wand," he crowed, grabbing his crotch, "when I got this".

Time meant nothing to fairies but Onyx knew that she missed Man. She thought about him when she slept and imagined gyrating with him again. She became irritable with everyone so that when she finally caught his scent and knew he was coming, her choices for another fairy to join her were limited. She grabbed the hand of one and forced her to fly with her.

Gareth, riding the giant palomino, grinned as he approached the rock where he'd first seen Onyx. They looked like they were waiting for a bus and Onyx was bouncy with eagerness. He eyed approvingly the plump little fairy, the color of Wizard's Pepto, who stood shyly next to her.

He looked around them and saw an open-mouthed cave with a boulder beside it. He scooped them up and urged the horse that he'd named Gold to run toward it. He was almost as excited as Onyx but wanted to appear cool. He set them down and magically rolled the boulder/door to cover the entrance, created subdued lighting and made a fluffy bed for the three of them.

He motioned for the girls to join him. Onyx began quickly flying to him then had to go back to drag the other one. They lay side by side for the transformation.

Scabior shook his head in wonder, as he looked at the small strip of black and thicker stripe of pink awaiting his touch. _Some time between attacking Dumbledore, becoming a thief and snatcher and cuckolding Weasley, I must have been very good to deserve this._

He performed the magic and waited for the fairies to react. When they'd reached their full size, he said, "Now it's time to play".

He kissed Onyx and felt the other female's glare. "Why don't you kiss her, Onyx?" he suggested. She complied with disinterest. Scabior saw the pink one's light gray eyes sparkle with excitement and her arms outstretched, as Onyx pulled away from her.

"I think she might like you more than me," he said. "But who wouldn't want you?" he added, touching the side of Onyx's face.

"What shall we name her?" He turned Onyx toward the other fairy, who closed her eyes and made tiny sounds of pleasure, as Scabior used Onyx's hand to caress the bright, pink skin.

He grinned as he said to the shy fairy, "I've never seen anything so pretty and round and pink and…fuzzy," commenting on the soft rosy down that lightly covered her "…just like a pygmy puff". She frowned at that. He chuckled. "I know you're prettier than that but still…I'll call you Puff." She scowled. He enlisted Onyx. "Do you like that name for her?" She nodded and Puff was happy.

Suddenly Gareth felt a burning in the brand on his arm. "I have to go," he said, raising his hand to begin the reversal.

"No," Onyx grabbed him and stared into his eyes to send a message to him, "why?"

"I have to see someone," he explained.

"Man see someone and come back," she transmitted, running her hand across his chest and kissing him. She understood him, how to keep him enthralled and get what she wanted. "'Nyx and Puff play 'til Man come back." She stretched across him to kiss her pink companion. Puff put her arms around Onyx's neck and rubbed a fleshy leg along her side.

Scabior watched them then rose with difficulty. "Alright," he said, "I'll come back".

Onyx made sure he saw her rolling Puff on top of her and continuing to kiss and grope.

He left, almost as anticipatory of returning as he was in hurrying to meet Hermione.

Inside the cave Onyx flew to the small crack he left between the cave and the boulder and watched him ride away from her. Puff flew behind her, put her arms around her and placed small kisses between her wings. Onyx pushed her away with angry sounds and returned her concentration to the thin opening and Man's return.

Time meant nothing to a fairy. She hovered and waited.


	10. What She's Here For

"Oh, Gareth, I've missed you," cried Hermione, throwing herself on Scabior as soon as he entered his glassed-in retreat, and kissing him wildly.

He was surprised by the ferocity of her greeting and the fact that she'd already taken off all of her clothes. He had thought after their time apart that she'd be timid and had actually looked forward to gently easing her into comfort and intimacy. "Hermione," he said passionately, as she pulled off his shirt and went to work on his pants, "I've missed you. I've wanted you bad."

"That's what I'm here for," she said with unexpected brazenness, as she led him to the over-sized bed and lay on top of him. More surprises awaited him, as she used her mouth, hands and body to quickly bring him to arousal and took her place on the seat of power. "Oops, Prophylla," she said as an afterthought, explaining to him as she rapidly moved on him that she and Ron didn't use contraception.

Gareth heard Hagrid lumbering toward his copse of trees on a routine forest inspection. Hermione didn't notice, as her pleasure mounted to its highest point. Gareth covered her mouth with his own, just before she could cry out and alert her oldest friend at Hogwarts to what she was currently doing.

"I've missed holding you," he said, lying next to her. "Nothing is as soft or sweet to hold as you are."

"I've missed your…power and the way you feel…all over me," Hermione said breathily, burying her face on the side of his neck then lightly touching it with the tip of her tongue.

"But didn't you just return from a second honeymoon with your husband? Was it that bad?"

"Oh, no," Hermione said. "It was wonderful, especially compared to the first. We're both much better lovers now than we were then. Ron liked having sex places muggles couldn't."

Scabior smirked. "Yeah, that's always fun."

Hermione nodded and looked into his eyes. "Do you know what's even more fun? We used the invisibility cloak for sex surrounded by people and they didn't know." She giggled, her brown eyes dancing.

He smiled at her excitement. "Did you do a muting charm on each other or muffliato for the people around you?"

"Usually the muting charm," she said, bored with the details, "except when we were in a castle that was supposed to be haunted. We made as much noise as we wanted and the tourists thought we were really randy ghosts."

This time he laughed with her. 'Sounds like you got the most out of that cloak."

Hermione looked more mischievous. She was quiet as she shifted position then said, "Sometimes I let the cloak fall off of me. If I saw a really attractive man…I watched his face go from shock to excited and then disappointed when I disappeared."

Gareth was surprised, not so much about dropping the cloak, (all wizards loved to tease muggles) but that she engaged in flirting with other men while making love to her husband. "Did Ron know about that?"

"No, Ron's far too conservative for that," she answered, grazing Scabior's chest with the tip of a fingernail.

He chuckled, thinking that two minutes ago, he would have thought Hermione was too conservative for that. "So you just suddenly appeared lying down in front of people?"

"I told you only when there was a really attractive man and if he was more or less alone. But sometimes I was on top and let someone see me from the side. And once Ron had me against the wall so the two men there saw half of me, with my leg up on his hips that they couldn't see. They came toward me," she said with an excited giggle, "so I had to duck back under quickly that time." Her breath increased as she told the story. She wiggled uncontrollably. She was aroused.

Gareth raised his eyebrows. "Are you pleased to know that you can shock me?"

She sighed. "If felt…good…to know I could make a man react like that, like he was attracted to me."

He looked at her questioningly. "Aren't you used to that?"

"No," she said, shaking her head emphatically, "I've never been attractive to many people. At school my hair was really impossible and I had buck teeth and more limbs than body. No one ever wanted me but Ron and I guess that was more because we were with each other so much. And…you've told me your interest in me is because I make you feel better about yourself".

Scabior looked disbelievingly at her. How could she not know? "I can assure you, Hermione, brightest witch of all, that there were other people at school who thought about you and, as you got older and grew into your body, wanted you. You just scared the hell out of them."

She smiled briefly, not convinced. "Are you hungry," he asked.

She gave a small nod. He crooked a finger and a lap table from the other side of the room flew to them. She was impressed again by all he could do without a wand.

"That's nothing," he said, enjoying showing off for her. "Wait 'til you see this." He sat up on his knees and clapped his hands over the table, reminiscent of Dumbledore, with a better chest. And, like Dumbledore, it resulted in food appearing on the table.

"How did you do that?" Hermione asked. She was well aware of the difficulties in procuring food from her months in hiding with Ron and Harry and the restrictions of Gamp's Law of Transfiguration.

"The same way Dumbledore did it," Gareth explained. "The kitchen staff responds to anyone from school. You know when he used to say 'help will always be given at Hogwarts to those who ask for it'? This was one of the ways help would be given. He just didn't tell anyone," he said, the old resentment returning to his voice.

Hermione pretended not to hear the edge in his tone and dug into the delicacies before her. Scabior watched her then, with a pass of his hand, the food and table disappeared.

He lay her back on the pillows and leaned over her. "I want to be very clear about this," he said softly, touching her face. "I love being with you, not because it makes me feel noble, but because you're one of the most desirable women I've ever seen. And that opinion is shared by the majority of the population. Do you understand?"

She nodded happily, finally convinced.


	11. Stronger Claim

"Let's go, Gold," said Gareth to the giant horse after Hermione left. "I need to release those fairies." They galloped to the area of the forest where Onyx and Puff waited in the cave.

Onyx caught his scent before she saw him ride into the clearing, the red sunset offering him the perfect lighting, as it emphasized his bare chest and glinted the dark curls of his hair.

Her breath quickened. Mindful of what she'd told him they would be doing while he was gone; she called Puff over to her. The plump pink fairy had sat silently watching her after Onyx's rebuff earlier. Now she eagerly flew to her.

Onyx leaned against a smooth rock that was almost like a tilted wall. She kissed Puff then pushed her head down, just before Gareth rode up to the cave. She squeezed her nipples to make them hard and pointy, the way she knew he liked them. She was in faux rapture as he rolled away the boulder and stepped inside.

Whether he'd planned to just return them to their original size or something else, all thoughts left him when he saw Onyx, with parted lips and slowly-raising eyes, hold out her arms for him.

He kissed the lips first, then her neck, breast bone, stomach…slowly moving down until he took Puff's place, kneeling before the exquisite black fairy, as if at an altar to be sanctified with his tongue. This time her ecstatic sounds were genuine.

He looked up at her. "Can you fly us over to the bed?" She nodded and lifted herself into the air, with Scabior, clutching her hips and his head buried between her legs, as he continued his adulation.

Puff followed, resenting him for interrupting her and Onyx, just when she'd finally called for her to play.

Gareth returned to Onyx's mouth and beckoned for Puff to join them. He wrapped an arm around her. "You're so cute," he said playfully, brushing his face on her downy skin with a silly smile. "But neither of us are good enough for her, are we? She's too beautiful for the likes of us. Maybe we should console each other," he continued, kissing Puff, while still running a hand over Onyx's body.

Onyx looked at the two of them and decided to take matters into her own hands. She pulled Gareth back to her and kissed him then looked into his eyes. "Make Puff small and send away," she transmitted to him. " 'Nyx only want Man."

"But, Onyx, I'm enjoying both of you," Gareth said in response, pulling Puff close so that the three of them were clustered together. Puff began nuzzling the side of Onyx where she lay.

Onyx concentrated again. " 'Nyx do anything, be everything. Man not miss Puff."

"God, she's beautiful," he thought, staring into her black eyes. She sensed she had him but, for good measure, repeated, " 'Nyx only want Man."

Sighing, Gareth stretched his body across Puff's shorter one and began the reversal incantation. She flew away, twittering angrily. He chuckled as he watched her fly through the crack between the cave entrance and the boulder.

Onyx placed small kisses around his face until he turned back to her. She kissed him happily then glided her lips and nose around the scar that encircled his neck…until she got a whiff of an unfamiliar smell…floral and, to her, threatening.

"Ah, you smell Hermione, don't you," he said.

"Her-mine," Onyx repeated slowly to herself, then, realizing what she smelled and what she said, she locked her eyes on him. "No, Man mine, not Her-mine." She rubbed herself against him, thinking to him " 'Nyx only want Man; Man only want 'Nyx."

"I like it when you call me Man. But my name is Gareth. Can you speak at all?"

She nodded and said in a tiny voice, "Gaaare."

"Close enough," he said, smiling. She was mesmerizing. "Yes, Onyx, when I'm with you, I want only you. Hermione doesn't concern you. It's just a prior and slightly stronger claim."

Onyx smiled, satisfied, and began fulfilling her promise to do anything and be everything for him.

On the other side of the boulder, Puff watched Onyx intently, as she and Man played without her.

* * *

Hermione arrived home shortly before Ron was due to return from his trip to Ireland with Harry to watch Ginny's quidditch match.

She had just gotten in the bathtub, when Ron came in grinning, already taking off his sweater and kicking off his shoes. "That's what a man wants to come home to," he said enthusiastically, "his wife, wet and naked."

Removing his pants, he said, "Can you make it bigger?" and after a wave of Hermione's wand, "Whoa, I was talking about the tub but…your choice."

"Sorry," she said absent-mindedly, about to use her wand to correct her mistake.

"No, no," he said quickly, stepping into the normal-sized bath. "We'll keep it that way if you think you can handle it. But you'll have to enlarge the tub for there to be enough room."

Smiling, Hermione silently did the Engorgio charm a second time, then floated over to her playfully aroused husband.

They swirled endlessly in the heated pool, not wanting to break the connection, in no hurry to reach an apex.

When they did finally leave the tub, Ron carried her, with her legs wrapped around his waist and the two of them still joined, to the bed. Out of the water, their urgency increased and they moved with each other in perfect harmony, until crying out in shared relief.

Ron continued to clutch her, eventually saying, "I'm starving. But I don't want either of us to get up."

"Let me try something," said Hermione, sitting up and clearing away the bedside table. She concentrated on food and Hogwarts and clapped her hands over the table, which was suddenly covered with enough choices to satisfy even her voracious man.

"How did you do that?" he asked with delighted shock.

"It's something available to anyone from Hogwarts who needs it," said Hermione, "though I don't think it should be used often. We'll say this is a special occasion."

"What's the occasion?" he asked, popping a croquette into his mouth then hers.

"Just that we want each other more than we want to get up for food," she answered, now regretting her action, because she could tell that Ron had other questions…but they didn't come.

He shook his head ruefully. "All the times I was such an ass about food and we could have just summoned it from Hogwarts?" He leaned his head on her shoulder. "I'm sorry."

"It was a long time ago, Ron-chy," she said, calling him the name that she'd given him on their wild, sexy honeymoon. "We didn't know."

"Yeah," he said, his voice taking on a note of irritation, "If Dumbledore had any idea of what we were going to be doing, he should have told us."

"Well, maybe he would have if he hadn't been killed," she reasoned.

"Maybe," he said softly. No longer hungry, he wrapped her in his arms. "I don't like thinking about our being at odds, like we were then or…"

He raised her head and placed a gentle hand on the side of her face. "You love me, don't you?"

"Yes, very much," Hermione answered, curious about this change in mood.

"And you don't see that changing, do you?" he asked.

"No," she responded, still confused.

He smiled. "I don't either." He rubbed his face on hers. "You won't always be so restless, Hermione. It will pass. Just remember who loves you," he said with a kiss. "Has always loved you," he added, kissing her again, "and always will." The pronouncement ended with a final kiss then Ron pulled her close again.

She tried to raise her head, so that she could see the confirmation in his face of what she thought she'd heard him say, but he held her tightly, yet tenderly in that position.

Even if she had seen him though, she wouldn't know anymore than she did. Ron had proven himself so well as an auror because he had enviable contacts and he'd learned to control his emotions and expressions. So when he wanted to be...when he needed to be, like now, he was inscrutable.


	12. Fairy Customs

His scent was strong. Onyx sniffed as she flew, darting around trees and plants. She became more excited as she drew closer. Her heart skipped when she saw him.

Scabior was sitting on the ground in a sunny glen, tending a baby thestral. Onyx stayed back in near awe to watch him. The first time she'd seen him he was caring for a thestral who had just given birth. She wondered if that was the female standing there now, so trusting in Gareth's ministrations to her baby.

His hands were gentle but assured. She remembered thinking that she wanted them on her. He spoke to the animals as he cared for them. She'd wanted him to speak to her in that seductive, slightly raspy voice. She'd realized that was why she wasn't happy about her planned mating with the prince of fairies. She wanted a man—that man.

Onyx had heard about the woman spell. It was only supposed to be done when a wizard was ready to commit to a fairy, because of the risk of the knowledge passing to someone who would abuse it. She was resourceful though and found the incantation and learned the appropriate hand gestures. She was the most beautiful fairy, which meant she was the most exquisite creature in the forest. She thought she could make him love her.

But he had the "prior and slightly stronger claim" to Her-mine that prevented her hopes from being realized. She knew he could be trusted, but technically, she'd endangered all of her fairy sisters to have him…occasionally and without commitment. If she'd told him that part of the spell though, she knew he would have never transformed her.

About that she was right. Gareth had enough problems with Hermione. It was probably inevitable that with two men who found her irresistible that she'd change. She'd repressed herself for so many years, he'd learned, and believed she was unattractive. When she accepted that she actually was very desirable, she couldn't simply make it another aspect of her life. It became her primary focus. She was voracious with Ron and Gareth. He knew from people in the ministry that she dressed and spoke more provocatively and gave the impression that she was…available. She wasn't believed to have become involved with anyone else, though it was probably just a matter of time. He hoped that his contacts were exaggerating. Still...

"It's all your fault, ya dirty bastard," Gareth berated himself. He finished treating the baby and gave the mother an apple, for which he received an affectionate nuzzle from her. Then they flew away.

He leaned back against a tree trunk, further chastising himself. "You had no right to be obsessed with her in the first place and when you heard she was married, you should've stopped thinkin' about her. But no…you convinced yourself her marriage was miserable and she needed you. Now look how good things are for her. Is there nothin' soft and lovely that you can't corrupt?"

As if in answer to his question, he felt something small and sweet-smelling against his cheek. He smiled and carefully pulled it away from the side of his face to hold directly in front of him. "Hello, Onyx," he said, almost gratefully, "How did you know I needed you?"

She shrugged her tiny shoulders and communicated to him the simple message, " 'Nyx knows Man".

"Mmm," he said, beginning the massage of her muscles as she hovered in front of him, "you want only Man, right?"

She answered with a nod. He recited the incantation in his head, as he continued his questions. "You're not going to change who you are because of me, are you?" She shook her head with a little pout.

The surges were rippling through her body. She closed her eyes as she felt his final caresses to her face. She was suddenly standing in front of him at her full size. She dropped to her knees to wrap her arms around his neck and tease his mouth with her own.

He sighed as he lay back, stroking her ebony-colored limbs. He clutched her and breathed in the scent of her skin and hair. "What do you eat to make you smell and taste so delicious?" he asked, kissing her face.

She looked into his eyes mischievously and asked silently, "…besides Man?"

"Yes," he said with a grin, amazed at how quickly she learned vernacular, "what is the fairy diet?"

"Fairies eat nectar," she communicated to him.

"Well that explains it," he said appreciatively, still holding her close on the warm grass. "You're just like a walking, flying, kissable honey comb, aren't you?"

Again she nodded, wondering if he was finished with his questions. He had one more.

"Do you like me enough to just lie here with me in the sun? I'd like to know that I can hold something as sweet and good as you without ruinin' it."

She rested her head on his chest in answer. He sighed and said, "You're good for my ego...and my restless spirit. Why would I ever leave this place as long as you're here and you want me?" She squeezed him tighter. They lay quietly and Gareth drifted off to sleep in contentment, until he felt the burning on his arm. "I have to go, Onyx," he said softly, beginning the reversal in his head.

She sat up in protest. " 'Nyx want to stay woman so Man come back".

He shook his head. "You're small for a reason; it protects you. I'm not leaving a naked, gorgeous woman in the woods alone."

She frowned. "Man come back?"

"If I can," he said distractedly, resuming the incantation and calculating how long it would take to return to his place, where Hermione waited for him.

Back to her original size, Onyx watched Gareth mount the giant palomino. She impulsively flew to grab on to the horse's tail.

Fairies weren't able to go beyond a certain point in the forest, unless accompanied by someone who could give them access. Sneaking across the barrier with him was another violation, but she had to know…was it Her-mine again? Did Man want Her-mine more than 'Nyx? Why?

Behind a tree, the fuzzy, pink fairy, who regularly followed Onyx now, observed her with Gareth and watched in horror as she stowed away on the horse. She might be indulged as the most beautiful, but this time she'd gone too far.


	13. Irritants

Since Gareth wasn't in his glass house, Hermione went looking for him. She concentrated on his dark, good looks and the way she felt around him then used her wand as a homing device. It began to vibrate as she and Gareth came closer to each other and she quickened her pace. The dark forest gave way to a bright meadow. She saw Gareth on his horse on the other side of the meadow and ran to meet him.

_It's Saturday_, he thought to himself, galloping more than halfway across the divide, _why is she wearing her ministry robe? And why is it so short?_ he wondered, concentrating on her flashing legs. He leaned down to lift her onto the horse and chuckled inwardly with his first answer. She had become fond of wearing her robe with nothing underneath.

She seated herself facing him on the horse. "Where did you get that robe?" he asked. With her legs wrapped around him, there was very little covering her lower body.

"It's my first one from Hogwarts," she explained, unzipping it then pressing herself against him. He laughed again and slid his hands over her then put his arms around her waist. She tilted back her head and opened her mouth a little for his kiss. He pulled her even closer and they seemed to melt together.

Upon crossing the fairies' meadow barrier, Onyx felt a surge to let her know that she was now free to move on her own. She wanted to see this Her-mine with the loud, ugly voice. She let go of the horse's tail and floated up so that she was looking down on her and Man. Her tiny body could barely contain her anger when she saw Gareth kissing the pale, bushy-haired woman passionately.

The palomino Gold ambled along while Hermione began opening the crotch of Gareth's pants. She lay back on the broad neck of the massive horse, which was almost like being in a reclining chair.

"On the horse?" Gareth asked, surprised.

She giggled. "What good is it to have a giant horse if you don't do things on it that you can't do on a regular horse?" she reasoned with a sultry note in her voice.

Onyx's seething raised even higher. She flew around to the side of the animal where she could pull out her little handfuls of Her-mine's hair without Man seeing her.

Hermione was too excited to feel the insignificant tugs on her tresses. She looked up at Gareth with quiet longing and sighed softly.

His eyes seemed to become a bit misty as he looked at her and he laid one of his large hands on the side of her face. "Ahhh, don't lose this, Hermione," he said, emotion making his voice shake.

"Lose what?" she asked, using a fingernail to trace his upper torso.

"That look of…expectancy, almost innocent yearning," he said. He lowered his head to nuzzle her neck and shoulder. "It's what I wanted most from you—that soft freshness".

Hermione pushed her hips up against his. "I'm a married woman with a lover," she said with her typical logic. "How long do you think I can look innocent?"

Onyx was incensed. Her-mine said married and called Man lover. She took a vicious bite of Hermione's leg. Her victim shook it, as if to shoo away a gnat or fly.

Gareth regarded Hermione for a moment then said, "You can keep it longer, if there aren't anymore".

"What do you mean?" she asked, interrupting her efforts to get him to thrust with her.

"You've been thinking about other men, haven't you?" he stated, keeping his eyes on her.

She shrugged. "So? A lot of people do that; it doesn't mean anything…just random thoughts about random people."

"Krum?"

She had turned her head slightly, looking for the source of irritation on her arm. She turned back to him in surprise at the name.

Scabior continued. "I wouldn't think of an international quidditch star, who was the first person to show interest in you, as random."

"How did you know that I knew him?" Hermione asked.

The steady gaze didn't let up. "I know as much about you as anyone does," he stated.

He pulled her close. "I'm sorry you didn't get the promotion," he said, the earlier censure gone from his voice.

She harrumphed, the sound muffled by his chest. "Did you hear who did?"

"Yeah, I heard." He stroked her hair, thinking that maybe if her professional life were more satisfying, that she wouldn't concentrate so much on fantasies.

"I guess you were right about house politics in the workplace," she said bitterly. "He hasn't even worked there before."

Gareth sighed and repositioned her in his arms in a cradle. "Maybe it's time you think about doing something else," he suggested. "It wasn't your life-long goal to evaluate prisoners at Azkaban, was it?"

"No," she said dreamily, again not able to keep her hands off of his muscles. "I guess I've already gotten more than I could've hoped for from that job."

"What?" he asked, surprisingly thick-headed.

"You," she answered simply.

Gareth grinned at her and bent his head to kiss her again.

Onyx had enjoyed the tension that she felt when they were talking about Hermione with other men. With this return to loving actions on his part, her rancor escalated again.

"Can we go back to the house now?" Hermione whispered, pressing her lips on the side of his neck.

"Home, Gold," Gareth commanded, "fast". The renewed passion in his voice was obvious to both of the females there who had heard it before. Onyx grabbed the tail again, as the huge animal pounded through the forest and arrived quickly at the evergreen copse that shielded the glass house.

Hermione and Gareth hurried inside and jumped into bed. Onyx managed to flit in after them, just before the door sealed itself.

Watching them engage in sex was too much for the little fairy and she buried herself in the folds of Hermione's robe, a plan for revenge already forming in her quick mind. She fought the bitter tears, as she heard their chorus of moans, sighs, grunts and outcries. "Man mine," she said to herself, repeatedly and broken-heartedly.

Scabior leaned back with a contented groan. "Now that's the Hermione Granger Weasley, who champions house elves and jumps on the backs of dragons."

Hermione laughed. "And that's the Gareth Scabior who would take on Dumbledore."

He turned to curl up with her on their sides. "Mmmm, now sleep with me," he whispered.

"I thought that's what we just did," she said, still with a lilt in her voice.

"No, I mean really sleep," he clarified. "It's one of the things I envy Ron most…exhausting you with sex then falling asleep with you that happy and satisfied."

Hermione tried to comply but she was fidgety. First there was that huge fly or hornet or something that kept buzzing around her. Then she didn't think of connubial bliss with Gareth; she had Ron for that.

"And Man have 'Nyx, evil woman," thought Onyx, reading Hermione's mind and continuing the torment.

She returned to the concealment of Hermione's shorty robe, as Gareth began stirring again.

"Why can't you relax?" he asked Hermione, massaging her neck and shoulders to lull her.

She turned toward him and began nibbling his neck and chest. "I don't want to relax with you; I want to fuck with you," she stated.

A shocked Scabior stretched across her. "I can fuck with anyone," he said, "I want more than that with you. I thought you did too."

"What do you mean you can with anyone?" Hermione asked, her voice going higher, as she tried to push him off of her.

"Yeah, what do you mean you can with anyone?" Onyx thought too, coming out of the security of the robe to buzz angrily around the edge of the room.

"I'm not married," he responded, sliding off of Hermione so she could move freely.

"Oh, and because I am, I'm supposed to accept your double standard?" she asked, sitting up and looking back at him with resentment. "I can fuck anybody," she mocked him, "and for you, it's okay to cheat on your husband with me, but no one else. If it doesn't bother Ron, it shouldn't bother you."

"Wha' the 'ell are you talkin' abou'?" Scabior asked, his old cockney roots resurfacing as he angered.

"Ron said he knows I won't always be so restless and for me to just remember who loves me," Hermione said, as if that should halt all argument.

Gareth's dark brown eyes snapped as he absorbed that statement. His response was measured and low. "Well, like you said, _he_ loves you. I won't be that understandin'. I'll share you with Ron, because I have to, but no one else."

Onyx was delighted with this development and returned again to the robe.

Hermione scowled. "Fine," she said, rising from the bed and walking over to the table, where sat a bottle of wine and two glasses. She took a quick drink, stepping on her robe in her distraction. "You don't have to worry about sharing me with anyone. It's none of your business what or who I do," she threw out, bending down for the robe.

"Find someone else to share you old man naps," she finished with a flourish, throwing on the robe and disapparating.

Just before she disappeared, Gareth noticed something black flying and attaching itself to the robe. It was too big for an insect… "Onyx, noo!"


	14. Punish

Anger wafted from Hermione as she apparated back to her apartment after the argument with Scabior.

"Ohhh, the nerve. How dare he think that he has some kind of control over what I do? And how did he know what I've been thinking?" she asked herself, as she tossed her robe on the bed and retreated to her bath.

Onyx flew around the bedroom. She looked through Hermione's closet, examined items on her dressing table and snooped as only a jealous six-inch fairy could. She saw Crookshanks' green eyes watching her from his corner of the room.

In the tub Hermione lay back and closed her eyes. "What's wrong with a little fantasy? It's not like I'm going to pop over to Bulgaria to see Viktor in the next two weeks. If anything, I'd wait for when he comes to England next month." (Yes, she knew his schedule.)

She got out of the tub and, wearing a terry cloth bathrobe, got milk and food for Crookshanks. "And who doesn't think about Shacklebolt?" she reasoned. "He's so much more…imposing and masculine than Fudge."

Crookshanks growled again and Hermione rolled her eyes. All that cat ever did anymore was growl or hiss at her. He was as bad as Gareth.

She stretched out on the couch in the living room. "Maybe I was too hard on him," she said, her voice taking on a lazy, sensuous note. She slowly moved around on the couch while opening her robe. "I'd hate to think of not having those eyes and hands on me again," she whispered, beginning to touch herself.

Onyx spit on her but Hermione didn't even notice.

"Mmm, he's just crazy about me. I shouldn't be mad at him for that."

Onyx looked for something she could use—something small and sharp—to cut Her-mine. Her eyes fell on Crookshanks.

"I told him I'd gotten more than I could've expected from my job when I got him—the best Azkaban had to offer," she said with a lascivious giggle.

"Man mine," Onyx communicated menacingly to Crookshanks, "not Her-mine. Her-mine come back, 'Nyx kill".

"It's not her fault," Crookshanks defended Hermione. "He made her think in ways that she never really has. She's changed." The cat drooped as he transmitted that thought to the black fairy.

"No, Man good," Onyx argued. "Love 'Nyx, 'cept for 'prior claim'".

"Ahhh, Gareth," Hermione purred from the other room. The fairy zipped in, enraged, with Crookshanks hurrying after her, advising restraint.

"Alright then," she said to him through their mental channels, "punish. Make Her-mine not want to come back to forest".

"How?" asked the cat, not anxious to harm his beloved mistress.

_Stupid animal,_ thought Onyx to herself. To the cat she transmitted, "Her-mine hide bad thoughts in head. Make thoughts plain, not hidden."

Crookshanks considered a moment. "I can't do that to her."

Onyx persuaded him with a repeat of her threat, "Her-mine come back, 'Nyx kill". She didn't bother to tell him that only fairy chieftains were able to kill. She added lying to her list of transgressions on behalf of Scabior.

"Man mine," she said, hovering over a napping, euphoric Hermione with jealousy and resentment.

* * *

"Hermione," Krum squinted in the hazy afternoon light of his hotel room. "What are you doing here?" he asked, as he pulled off his quidditch uniform.

"I came to see you play," she said, slowly moving closer to him. "You were wonderful; you look wonderful," she added, eyes glued to his chest, until they dropped to the muscles of his thighs, on display with the shorts he was wearing.

"Thank you," he said, returning her gaze, "You're…beautiful".

Her smile made him feel sudden tension in his head and throughout his body. _If she'd look at me like that vhen I first knew her…things vould've been very different._

She was almost close enough for him to touch. "Aren't you married to vun of the Veasley boys?"

"Yes," she conceded, dropping her eyes and running a hand over his arm, "is this the first time you've had a married woman in your room?"

"No, but…"

"…but what?" she prompted, within millimeters of pressing her body against his.

He looked at the new brazenness in her face. "You've changed."

She smiled. "Who hasn't?"

Krum grabbed her and pushed her down on the large sofa to his right. "Alright," he said, "but I vant you to leave your husband and come vith me."

"Of course," Hermione said, lowering his head to hers.

* * *

She gasped and sat up from her couch where she'd fallen asleep. "Where did that come from?" She'd never leave Ron, no matter how attractive Viktor looked. Subconsciously she began rhythmically scooping her pelvis. He wouldn't ask her to do that if she really saw him. He'd just be happy with…

At that moment Ron came through the door. Hermione jumped up from the couch and threw herself into his arms.

Ron returned her frantic kisses and followed her to the bedroom. He had no timidity in loving her now. He knew what she wanted. Today she needed him to hold her and move slowly.

She clutched him more tightly, clearing all other men from her mind. "I love you, Ron," she said between her gasps.

"I love you, my veela," he responded, with a final thrust and kiss.

He held her tightly and saw that she was crying. "Are you alright?"

"Yeah," she answered, "I'm just…I dreamed we weren't together anymore".

He looked at her. "Well I don't know about you, but that would be a nightmare for me."

"It was awful," she answered in a small voice, laying her head on his chest.

Ron glanced over at the bedside table and clapped his hands. The table filled with the bounty of Hogwarts. He and Hermione had agreed to treat themselves once a week, usually Saturday, to dinner in bed, courtesy of their alma mater. They ate their fill then made the repast disappear.

Ron cuddled her again and noticed that she couldn't be still. "You're still pulsing," he said, his voice muffled by her hair. "Do you want more?"

Hermione didn't want to draw attention to her gyrations, which she hadn't been able to stop, or the reappearance of Viktor in her mind.

"Just trying to hold onto the feeling," she said with a little giggle. "But no, I don't think I could take more tonight."

"Are you sure?" he asked, biting her neck, "I'll be glad to oblige".

"No, Ron-chy," she said, turning away from him on her side to minimize the actions of her pelvis, "I'll let you know if I simply must have you again. Right now, why don't you go to sleep?"

He rubbed her back and said with a chuckle, "Alright, if you need me, I'm just a sexy moan away." He deluminated the room and was soon snoring in contentment.

Hermione lay with her eyes open, beginning to feel a little pain from all of her hip movements, thinking it must be because of the fantasies that kept playing in her head.

From Crookshanks' corner in the room, Onyx cackled. "Her-mine not hide thoughts," she said gleefully.

Crookshanks watched Hermione nervously. He agreed that she needed this lesson but still hated her suffering.

Hermione got out of bed to go to the bathroom. She moved slowly as her hips continued thrusting. _What's wrong with me?_ she said to herself.

Her thoughts moved from Viktor to Shacklebolt then a big, blond man with green eyes. "Who is he?" she asked, imagining lying with him on a stone floor, in a room with stone walls and no windows.

Of course, she remembered his picture from the files on her desk of the latest Azkaban prisoners she was to evaluate that week.

"Heh," she said with a giggle, now with her face against the closed bathroom door and pressing into it, "maybe Gareth's not the best at Azkaban after all."

She performed Muffliato charm on the door so she wouldn't disturb Ron then let her fevered mind and body go, her fantasies becoming increasingly bizarre. She gasped and moaned over and over, expecting release at any moment but it never came.

All night she was on the verge of orgasm without achieving it and had no control to just stop.

"Hermione, can I come in?" asked Ron.

She looked around and realized it was morning.

She was lying on the plush throw rug on the floor. She tried to stand to open the door for him and discovered she couldn't move her legs. They were frozen in a bent and open position.

She removed the charms from the door so he could enter. He looked at her with confusion.

"I can't…move…my legs," she said through her cries and thrusts, "and…I…can't…stop." She laid her head on her arm and added tears to her uncontrolled functions. "What's….wrong….with me?"

Ron picked her up and carried her to the bed. He soon realized that he couldn't move her either. He threw a blanket over her and called "St. Mungo's".

"Keep punish," Onyx communicated to Crookshanks, just before she wished herself home.


	15. Professional Devleopment

Ron carried her through the door of St. Mungo's, as Hermione continued twitching and breathing rapidly, believing maybe this time….

Everyone in the waiting area looked up to see the source of those very obvious sounds. Ron performed a muting charm on her and bypassed the reception desk to view the sign directing patients. _Unexplained physical maladies, Sixth Floor,_ he read.

"Don't you want a floating gurney for her?" asked the receptionist. "The elevator isn't working."

"No," Ron said emphatically, holding her closer, "I'll carry her."

He headed for the stairwell. By the time they reached the fourth floor Ron was becoming tired, Hermione's non-stop gyrations making the climb more difficult, but he didn't stop.

On the sixth floor he stood at the window, away from everyone else, still holding her and trying not to notice the wild look in her eyes or her hands that wanted to rub herself when they got away from his grasp.

"Weasley," called the nurse. With relief Ron took her to the examination room to wait for the healer.

Hermione pulled him onto the examining table next to her and fumbled with the front of his pants. He struggled to stand.

"Hello," said a familiar high-pitched, sing-song voice from the door. Hermione craned her neck to look behind her at Luna Lovegood, student healer. Luna checked the patient name on the door. This couldn't be her friend Hermione—not this writhing, wild-haired, glassy-eyed woman on the table. She looked like a walker from Knockturn Alley.

"Luna," Ron said with surprise, jumping up from the table, "I didn't know you worked here."

She nodded, walking in and eyeing Hermione, whose physical distress was plain to see. "I've been here almost a year. It's good to see the two of you again. What seems to be the problem?" she asked with formality, though the problem was obvious.

Ron swept his arm toward the table and Hermione. "Are you joking? Look at her; help her."

Luna looked at Ron then back to Hermione. She walked over to him to lead him out the door. "I'll do my best," she reassured him. "If you can leave me alone with her, I'll call you back when she's healed."

Ron wanted to argue but the comparison to the demeanor of the two women in the room stopped him. Formerly flighty Luna looked like a young professional with her healer's robe and long blonde hair pulled back. He didn't want to see Hermione like she was anymore. With a tight nod and stroke of his wife's head, he left the room.

Luna turned back to Hermione, closing her eyes and running her hovering hands back and forth across the body of the still-squirming former classmate.

"Alright, we've all seen it," she intoned, lifting her head and directing the remarks to someone unseen, "You can stop now."

Abruptly Hermione's motion and panting ended. Luna turned away from her to make a note on the chart.

"At least you could have let me finish," Hermione said in a low, abashed voice. She sat up, pushing her hair back and straightening her robe.

Luna turned back to her. "It wasn't my choice, but my guess is your cat thinks you've had plenty of finishing lately."

"My cat…what does he have to do with this?"

Luna took a chair in front of the table. "He's been very worried about you," she explained. "I suppose he thought this was the only way to make you think about what you're doing."

"Crookshanks did this to me?" Hermione asked, leaning forward and pointing at herself disbelievingly.

Luna nodded and shrugged. "There are risks in adopting a familiar. That connection that the two of you form can be turned against you. Of course he can't do anything to you physically, but you allowed him access to your mind. He used that access."

"I don't see how…" Hermione began.

The healer continued in a professional vein, "He allowed you to explore your fantasies unchecked and kept you from achieving satisfaction in your mind...and your body reacted accordingly."

"That hairy little…" Hermione gripped the edges of the examining table and derided her pet through angry, clenched teeth.

In the waiting area Ron tried sitting, then standing against the wall, then pacing. He tried to listen at the door but the privacy charms on all of the consultation rooms prevented him from hearing anything.

Luna's look at Hermione was studied, as if trying to figure out how she'd changed. "It shouldn't be such a surprise to you. He's been trying to get through to you for a while, hasn't he?"

Hermione looked down, playing with the belt on her robe. "What did he tell you?"

Luna made another note in the chart. "He didn't _tell_ me anything. I just got a sense of both of your feelings before I broke the connection. He really didn't mind the affair because I guess it's helped…you and Ron(?) but the constant thoughts about other people really concern him."

Hermione studied the eye chart on the wall across from her. She used her nose to detect and identify as many of the potions as she could from the cabinet behind her. She did everything but return Luna's steady gaze.

"You can't imagine what it feels like," she finally said to the formerly child-like blonde, "the power that comes from knowing you can make anyone want you".

Luna decided not to take offense at Hermione's suggestion that she couldn't effectively employ her feminine wiles. She moved to stand leaning against the table so that she was next to the young woman she'd always admired.

"That power can be a dangerous thing," she said in a warning tone, "like the power you share with Crookshanks, it can turn on you. Your need for that feeling might become stronger than the want you inspire in someone."

Hermione looked at her thoughtfully. "I think I can handle it," she said with her old surety, "as long as my cat isn't torturing me."

Luna gave a nod of resignation. "Alright…well you're perfectly fine physically so I guess there's no more we can do for you. I'm here if you need to talk. And if you and Crookshanks are still at odds, you can send him to me for a while."

"Thank you," Hermione said, rising from the table. She walked to the door then turned around to face Luna again.

"You know," she began, "Professor McGonagall has invited me to join her coven, Witches for Wizarding Welfare".

"Oh really," said Luna with a lilt in her voice.

"Yes, it's quite an honor," Hermione said, lowering her head with a touch of humility. "It occurred to me…I haven't spoken to her about it…but she probably wouldn't mind if I brought you along…just to see if it could be a good fit for you."

Luna smiled, completely guileless. "Oh, that's very nice of you, Hermione, but I'm already a member."

"You are." Hermione couldn't keep the hint of surprise off of her face. _Luna a member before me, _she said to herself.

"Yes," the healer said, making the final note on Hermione's chart. "Hannah Abbott and I were initiated last year. So I'll see you at the next full moon."

Hermione smiled slightly then rejoined Ron. She told him Luna had said that her condition was stress-related (that was certainly true) then apparated with him back home, still thinking to herself…_Power can turn on you….Loony Lovegood and Hannah Banana before me...Where is that cat?_


	16. Mess of Things

The giant horse cleared the large stream and kept running, his golden mane blowing freely in the wind, along with Scabior's unruly black hair. Apoplectic with rage, worry and helplessness after Hermione left angry and unaware of the stow-away fairy, he pushed his horse to its limit all the way to Hogwarts' back gate, then sprinted to The Hog's Head.

Gareth needed help in monitoring what was going on with his two lovers and his community sponsor Aberforth Dumbledore had even better contacts than he did.

Seeing the younger man's agitation, Aberforth gave him fire whiskey in a butter beer bottle. He drove out his few customers and closed the bar then turned his attention to Scabior.

The rustic room was silent as a crypt except for Gareth's low, raspy voice. He choked out the story, aware that he was incriminating himself for a number of probation violations—fraternization with law enforcement personnel, unauthorized use of magic and failure to follow the direction of his employer, Hagrid, who had warned him about becoming involved with magical creatures.

"Well, Scabe, you've really made a mess of things," stated Aberforth.

Gareth pushed back his dark, curly hair and groaned in powerless frustration.

Aberforth used his wand to contact some wizards and witches around Diagon Alley. "If something happens, we'll know," he assured his distraught charge.

Gareth watched Aberforth with interest. "How did you use your wand to send messages?" His fascination with modifying his own magical abilities to compensate for not being permitted a wand momentarily distracted him from his concern for Hermione and Onyx.

"Ollivander's apprentice," explained Aberforth. "He wants to apply something like muggle technology to wands. He's developed texting for wizards. "With the upgrade ring, messages can go from one wand to another. The wizard gets the message by holding the wand to his temple."

"Can I see that?" Scabior requested.

Aberforth grinned slightly as he handed his wand to the other man. "Don't waste your time trying to figure it out for yourself. The Ministry can find out where the messages come from."

Gareth frowned.

Suddenly there was a sound of a crack and a female elf stood before them. She was wearing a little striped dress and her light brown hair was artfully curled up on the ends and tucked behind her pointed ears.

"Winky," Gareth said, turning toward her in surprise, "what are you doing here?"

She smiled, dropped her chin, then lifted her brown eyes coquettishly at him. "Winky hears you tell somebody in the kitchen that you likes t' know if we ever hears from the Granger girl. I come t' tells you that we just sends some food to hers apartment."

Gareth gave her a dimpled smile. "Thank you, Winky. That was very nice of you to come and tell me."

She giggled. Aberforth smirked behind his long beard. "You'd better hurry back to the kitchen, Winky. Maybe Scabe can come and see you when has more time."

With shiny, expectant eyes, she waved to Gareth then disappeared with a girlish crack.

Aberforth deadpanned, "Do you really need to add an elf to your collection, Scabe?"

The charismatic man gave him a withering look. "Have you heard anything, Abe?"

Aberforth glanced at the ring around his wand then pressed the tip of it to his head. "Weasley got there about an hour ago. So if they've had dinner from Hogwarts, they're probably in for the night and your little fairy isn't causing any trouble. Why don't you go home and get some sleep," he suggested. "You still have that mirror to receive messages?"

Gareth nodded.

"Well, you'll see if I know anything," Aberforth promised. "Try to keep your nose clean, huh?"

Gareth walked home at a much slower pace. _Weasley was there an hour before they ate. Guess I know what was goin' on in that time. I could live with her bein' satisfied with him...just don't think that's possible, the way she is now. And where the hell is Onyx? She's probably never been out of the forest before. What if she ran into somebody who knows the spell? She doesn't want just anybody; she's told me she just wants me. If someone else transformed her...I'll kill the son of a bitch who touches her._

He lay in his bed, unsleeping, looking at the night sky through his glass ceiling and trying to make some sense of his life in the pattern of the stars. He watched the mirror on the wall across from his bed, anxious for a message to scrawl over its surface.

The sun's glare had just touched the ceiling when Scabior saw words form on the mirror. He jumped to it from the bed to be as close to the news as possible. _They just left St. Mungo's—she's fine._

_She's fine, _he breathed in relief_, St Mungo's?_

He ran out of the house shouting, "Onyx!"

Gold followed him but Gareth continued running and yelling for the fairy, forgetting that a few hours earlier he'd hypothetically threatened anyone who would touch her.

He found her in the meadow where he'd lain with her the previous morning, feeling then that she could help him find peace of spirit.

"What did you do, Onyx?" he demanded.

She stuck out a three-inch leg for him to begin her transformation. He stood with his arms crossed and a stern look on his face. She lay down in front of him and tapped his foot with a tiny toe.

His brows were drawn together in a frown to match the one on his mouth. "Answer me," he ordered.

Onyx flew to hover at his eye level so she could transmit her thoughts to him. " 'Nyx not do anything."

"What happened to Hermione?" he asked in a clipped, low voice.

She shrugged. "Her-mine not hide bad thoughts. Cat make thoughts plain."

Gareth huffed and shook his head in disgust. "You hurt her. Why?"

She held out her chocolate chip-sized hands in supplication. " 'Nyx want Man. Man have 'prior claim' but Her-mine not good. Want Man aaand man with red hair...aand...black man at work...aand...pretty woman at work...aand...man with yellow hair on big rock...aand...man on broom...aaand..."

"Alright, Onyx, I get it. What's happened to her is my fault; I have to take care of her."

"Man still want Her-mine?" she asked disbelievingly. " 'Nyx only want Man. Want Man to only want 'Nyx."

His sigh was nearly strong enough to blow her away. "I wanted you both. But I can't have that. And I have to take care of her."

Onyx's lip trembled. "Why Man not love 'Nyx?"

He turned away and, from deep inside himself, dragged out his rejection of her. "I don't want to love you; you're not real...you have wings instead of clothes...I have to chant over you to make you large enough to hold and when I do, you're so unbelievably beautiful, I can't think around you."

Her tears fell so freely that her face seemed to disappear underwater, yet they pooled to no more than a single drop on the ground. " 'Nyx love man; 'Nyx real...and 'Nyx...hurt."

Puff watched the scene from behind a tree. She flew after Onyx when she zipped away from Gareth, who called after her, "I'm sorry, Onyx".

She caught up with Onyx at the rock where they had once waited for Gareth. "Man not want 'Nyx."

Onyx shook her head broken-heartedly.

"Man know spell but not take fairy," Puff continued. "Puff tell and Man die."

"Not tell," said Onyx simply.

Puff looked at her. "Chiefs kill Man to protect fairies."

"Not tell," Onyx said again. "Man not hurt fairies."

The fuzzy pink fairy looked frankly at the most beautiful of their species. "Puff want 'Nyx. 'Nyx do what Puff want or Puff tell."

Onyx had never liked Puff or been attracted to her the way she had been to other fairy sisters before discovering Gareth. She'd never trusted her. She saw now that she had been right not to do so and wrong to introduce her to Man. She tried to appeal to her. " 'Nyx only want Man."

Puff shrugged. "Man not want 'Nyx. Want Man die?"

Onyx shook her head in resignation.

The pink fairy grabbed the black fairy and pulled her into the cave with the boulder door. "Then come with Puff."

With that Onyx entered into voluntary subjugation to protect the man who didn't want her.

Back in his house Gareth continued to wrestle with his conscience. _All I wanted was to know how she felt. I didn't expect to care so much and so soon. _He really couldn't say at that point if he was speaking of Hermione or Onyx or both.

_Maybe I should go to America, get away from this mess. But I'll just create another one wherever I go._

He sat in an empty corner of his room, wedged between two cold glass walls. The overcast sky seen through the ceiling reflected his mood and opinion of himself. _Maybe I don't belong around good peopl...creatures," _he corrected himself.

Rain began and he felt drops falling on him from where his painstaking seals around the ceiling and walls were failing. _Maybe I'm not fit for anything but Azkaban._


	17. Stress Related

The scowl on Ron's face seemed to be permanent, as the phrase "stress-related" kept running through his head. His ears were nearly as red as his hair and his blue eyes glared from his stony face, like angry lapis lazuli.

"Stress-related, like...bloody hell," he growled. He'd overlooked whatever had been going on with Hermione the last month or so because things between them had been so good. But he couldn't ignore this. There was a reason that she'd had some "condition" that had manifested itself as uncontrollable dry-humping and he had to face it.

He stalked through the halls of the Ministry the day after taking Hermione to the hospital, convinced that everyone knew. The chip on his shoulder felt as though it was weighing him down and he shifted his head from side to side, looking for someone, anyone...

He heard two men ahead of him laughing. "Who are you laughin' at?" he demanded with a snarl.

The inoffensive and innocent wizards, pasty from years of their inside bureaucratic occupations, looked up at the younger, stronger and much more hostile man and gulped. "H-he was telling me a mother-in-law joke," one said. The other nodded, nervously blinking behind thick glasses.

"Alright then," Ron said shortly and moved away from them, the bottom of his robe straining against his legs with his extra-long, impatient stride.

"Well, I think you might have scared them into early retirement," Harry said wryly, having just witnessed Ron's misdirected exhibition of temper.

"Shut up, Harry," Ron said with warning in his tone.

"What's with you, anyway?" his friend and partner asked, as they left the Ministry to begin an investigation.

Ron groaned. "I don't know if I can trust Hermione."

"I thought things were so great for the two of you lately, what with all the bragging you've been doing," Harry said, just a little jealous.

They apparated to the village where they were looking for a group of suspected Death Eaters trying to resurrect their cause.

"Yeah, they have," Ron admitted. "But what if it isn't real? What if she's just pretending to be more interested in me to throw me off while she's fooling around with someone else?" he lamented, as they approached their target—a small, dark tavern called Legree's, with the telltale Death Eater's sign in place of the lowercase 'S'.

They fell into their natural position, with Ron on Harry's left, as they entered the bar. The lighting was dim, adding to the overall brownness of the room, from the dingy ceiling and walls, to the dirt on the stone floor. There was a block of wooden tables in the center of the room and none against the walls, giving the impression that they'd been pushed together for a meeting.

Harry used his peripheral vision to check his blind spots, hoping that Ron would remember their auror training and do the same.

"What can I get for you gents?" the burly bartender asked, as Harry and Ron approached him, wearing their Ministry robes and aura of authority.

"Just coffee, thanks," Harry said, worried that Ron might be too distracted to be of much help at this venue.

The tension had been almost immediate with their entrance. The bartender slammed down two mugs of coffee then stood in front of them, resting his hands on the bar so that his arms formed a wide triangle and looked at them expectantly.

Harry began "We're just here to make sure..."

"Expelliarmus," Ron suddenly shouted. Holding out his wand, he stepped over to the two men behind Harry, who had snuck out their wands to hex him.

The older one howled, as his wand flew from his hand with a decided sting, caused by the vehemence of the command. Ron caught the other wizard's wand in its mid-air flight to the person that called for it. He swept the room with his wand, his scowl now an effective deterrent against actions by any other wizards present.

He motioned for those two men to the middle tables with everyone else. Harry held his wand on the bartender to do the same.

"Ya got no right to be in here," said the bartender, forced to sidle his way from behind the bar because of the tight squeeze of his rotund frame. "We're not doin' anything wrong."

He stopped and eyed the young pair, who were disarming all of the other wizards in the tavern and controlling the room. "The two of you have gone around the last three years, like you're some kind of heroes. Well, the Dark Lord weren't the only one what cared about the purity of wizards. We'll get you all soon enough...especially you."

Ron gave the man who was now pointing at him his full attention.

"You're the worst," said the bartender with a sneer, "a pure blood married to that little mud..."

Ron hurled himself at the man, knocking him to the hard stone floor with his hands around the fat neck.

"That's enough, Ron," Harry barked, just before his partner could land the punch for which he'd pulled back his fisted arm.

With a look of contempt, Ron lifted himself from the floor, leaving the other man cowering there.

He and Harry performed Priori Incantatum on all of the confiscated wands and transported to jail those who had recently performed illegal spells.

"Wow, Ron," said Harry, "you..."

"...always have your back, mate," Ron said, putting his hand on Harry's shoulder as they left the much less crowded and more subdued saloon.

The shorter wizard looked up at his partner. "I was a little worried about you back there...thought you might've been thinking too much about Hermione. But you proved again that you can always be counted on."

Ron looked down sheepishly.

Harry continued. "Look, I don't know what's going on with Hermione; I haven't talked to her much lately. I think we both have to accept that if we want such fantastic women, others are going to want them too. There will always be temptation. And you know there is for us too. Haven't you noticed the way the women at work look at you or want to be so helpful and laugh at your...really bad jokes?"

Ron looked at his best friend and raised an eyebrow in query. "So what are you saying?"

Harry shrugged. "If you love her, (and no one who was in Legree's doubts that you do) fight for her."

_Of course I love her, _Ron said to himself after he and Harry separated. He walked from the Ministry to the Leaky Cauldron to allow himself time to think. His scowl softened and, thinking lovingly about his wife, his eyes lost their hardness and became fuzzy blue pillows.

He remembered their first kiss when she had thrown down the basilisk fangs she was holding and flown into his arms...her uncharacteristic vulnerability, needing him, after being tortured by Lestrange.

"Hermione," he breathed, thinking about her smile, her no-nonsense posture and gait, juxtaposed with the softness of her expression.

Then his thoughts turned to their recent history. He sighed as he imagined her look of desire—her lids closing slowly over her almond eyes and reopening with a shimmer that said "Now". He didn't want to lose that with her. "I have to fight for her without her knowing."

In his mind he scanned and touched her body, she whispered "Ron-chy," he held her close and felt her core of heat.

Thinking of her, he paid no attention to his surroundings, until he heard a persistent horn honk and turned to see the cabdriver, who had driven him and Hermione to Harry's house.

He stood on the sidewalk and she crossed the road to pull up along-side him. "I thought that was you," she said, "remember me?"

"Oh, yeah," he said, recognition and recall coming to him. "How are you?"

She smiled. "Fine, thanks. Do you want a ride somewhere? I'm off the clock now."

He grinned and opened the back door.

"Why don't you sit up front with me?" she suggested.

She was in her mid-20's, with pink tips at the end of her blonde hair. She had an infectious smile and, when he opened the door to sit in the seat next to her, her long legs and slender body were evident. "I'm Maddy," she said.

"Ron," he answered pleasantly.

"Where to, Ron?"

He gave an address for about a block from The Leaky Cauldron, since the London side of the wizard's portal was in a dodgy neighborhood.

She pulled into traffic and turned to him with a smile. "That's about where I picked you up the first time."

He nodded.

"So where's the pretty brunette you were with?"

"She's home," Ron answered, putting his hand on the door latch at they arrived at their destination.

Maddy put the vehicle in park position and turned toward him. "You know, there's a pub just over there," she pointed out. "Do you want to get a drink?"

A surprised Weasley shook his head no. "I appreciate the offer, Maddy, but I'm sort of anxious to get home to the pretty brunette."

Maddy shrugged. "Well, just in case she ever forgets (because, you know, sometimes couples forget) you can always remember that I think she's a real lucky lady."

She dared a touch on his arm. "I've seen a lot of guys make out in the back of my cab, and even more who wouldn't pass up my invitation the way you did. I've never seen another man though, who spoke so sweetly to his girl. You might as well have been talking in another language, but the feelings behind it really came through."

Ron watched her, in near shock.

She removed her hand. "Anyway, like I said...lucky lady. Maybe I'll see you around here again some time." She took a tiny bite of her lip. "Tell the lucky lady I said 'hi'."

* * *

Meanwhile Hermione, on her hands and knees in the bedroom, pulled Crookshanks out from under her dresser. "Ouch, you miserable animal," she shouted, as her cat scratched her, "that was a lousy thing that you did to me. I'm tired of your judgment, just because of a few random thoughts."

"_Not thoughts," _her familiar communicated to her, his green eyes penetrating, "_plans"._

She returned his stare and, with a frown, locked him into the pet caddy. "St Mungo's," she commanded, stabbing her wand at the box.

The feline embodiment of her conscience disappeared, just as Ron apparated into the room and she ran to greet him.


	18. Hagrid Helps

There hadn't been so many fifth-year girls in the library at one time since maybe when Harry Potter was a student and at the height of his popularity. They were all gathered now around a large table—whispering, giggling and intently watching the dark-haired man poring over the ancient books on magical creatures.

"Who is he?"

"I heard he's Hagrid's assistant."

"He looks almost...dangerous."

"But did you see his smile and dimples?"

"I can't get over the eyes."

"Where does he live?"

"If we haven't seen him before, probably in the Forbidden Forest."

"Oooh, it just became a little less forbidding. I wonder what he's doing here, besides making my heart race."

Oblivious to the conversation about him, Scabior went through the stacks of volumes on his table until he finally found it—the Woman Spell in a huge, dusty tome on Fairy Lore.

_The transformation can be dangerous for the fairy, resulting, in some cases, in permanent alteration. If not performed properly, the change might be only partially successful, there by rendering the fairy the size of a child, rather than a full-grown woman._

Gareth breathed a sigh of relief that Onyx had given him the spell correctly and they hadn't had those complications.

_Because of the extreme attractiveness of the fairies, the spell is restricted to a very select group—those wizards who are prepared, on pain of death, to commit to an individual fairy. Violation of this provision is also grounds to exile the fairy who "betrays" her species by sharing the information with one not willing to make that commitment._

He read through that passage several times to make sure he understood it, then rested his elbows on the table and his head on top of them in sad realization.

"Onyx," he whispered. She had risked so much and received so little from him. But now he had a death sentence hanging over him and he had to protect her too.

He took some notes with the parchment and quill he'd brought with him, saying to himself, "Clever, irresistible little fool...guess I have to talk to Hagrid."

* * *

"Ye think I tol' ye that jus' t'hear m'self talk or b'cause I dinna want ye t'have fun?" Hagrid asked, pacing in front of the entrance to the Forbidden Forest where Gareth made his partial confession.

He only told the expert on magical creatures that he'd been infatuated with a fairy who had given him the transformation spell. He wasn't seeing her anymore but was concerned for the safety of both of them, now that he understood the implications of their actions.

"Ye're great with the creatures phys'cly, but ye got ter unnerstan their minds," Hagrid continued. "They don't think like us. With some if you touch a female's hand, ye're mated fer life. Some think if ye mate with one, ye have to with all of 'em. And what d'ya think the other creatures think abou' what ye've done? B'cause they all know. Thar no secrets in the fores'. But they mus' like ye b'cause none of 'em have told me abou' it."

Gareth sighed deeply and dug his thumb and forefinger into the inner corners of his eyes, not satisfied with pinching the bridge of his nose. Talking to the half-giant brought out his own native accent. "Ye're righ', 'agrid. M'sorry. 'ow do I fix it?"

Hagrid threw up his arms in confusion, never having thought through how to fix such a situation.

"The fairies have a king and council of chieftains. They think as one; they don' use words like I, you or they."

Gareth felt a little tug at his heart, remembering that the beautiful fairy would always say 'Nyx want Man," never "I want you."

"The king will wan' ye ter point ou' the one that gi' ye the spell," Hagrid warned.

Gareth shook his head vehemently. "No. They can kill me bu' I won' betray 'er. I've 'urt 'er enawf."

Hagrid sighed again. "An' ye're sur ye don' wan' 'er?"

Scabior, sitting on a log, held his head in his hands. "I can'...she's no' the only woman I been involved wi'. Me firs' duty is t'er."

Hagrid looked at the younger man with disbelief, disgust and a tad envy. "Alrigh," he said with resolve, lumbering into the woods, "les' go".

They were quiet walking through the forest. Hagrid was dreading the formal presentation he'd have to make to the fairy council; Gareth was thinking about Onyx.

The forest, seeming to sense their mood, was also quiet. There was no sound of birds or other animals. Even the wind might have been influenced by them and was hushed.

Hagrid spotted a large leopard butterfly and held the delicate creature in his ham-like hand. He was sending a message for the butterfly to announce their arrival to the council.

"Now we wai'" Hagrid said, sitting heavily on a tree stump.

This time it was Gareth who paced, his body instinctively reacting to the proximity of the sensual, black fairy.

A jade green fairy suddenly flew into the clearing and beckoned for the two men to follow him.

They climbed down an embedded vine and root ladder into a hidden gorge—the fairies' lair.

There was a massive willow tree in the center of the enclave. In a large hole, about eye-level on the trunk, gathered the fairy chieftains. The fairy community, a rainbow of hues, hovered on the outskirts. A roan centaur arrived to act as interpreter for the humans.

Gareth looked in vain for Onyx. He realized he didn't see Puff, the pepto-pink fairy either.

They were at a tiny stream, where Puff ordered Onyx to bathe, then dry her with her drape of shiny black hair. "I'll decide what I want you to do next when I'm satisfied," Puff said, cupping the side of Onyx's face possessively.

Onyx dropped her eyes and nodded silently. She was resigned to her life of servitude and acquiescence to Puff's ever-increasing depravity to ensure Gareth's life, unaware of his ongoing effort to make both of them safe.

"He must give us the name," the centaur boomed for the white-bearded fairy king, sitting in the center of the council.

"I won't," Gareth stated, crossing his arms to emphasize his determined position.

"Do you realize we will kill you?" the centaur asked on behalf of a red fairy to the right of the king—his son, formerly betrothed to Onyx.

"I do," Gareth said firmly.

The council buzzed comment to each other then the centaur asked, "You protect her; yet you do not want her?"

"It's not that simple," Gareth said, looking with imploring eyes at the chieftains. "I wasn't honest with her. I had another woman and didn't tell her when she wanted to give me the spell. She had every reason to think I'd fall in love with her. I just can't."

The council members buzzed again. There hadn't been an execution during their tenure—not for the last 200 years. They didn't want to kill the brave, resolute man standing before them. Also some secretly believed they knew who his accomplice was and couldn't stand the thought of her exile.

The resolution masked Scabior's nervousness, as he waited to hear his fate and wondered again where was Onyx. He looked up at Hagrid, who laid a fatherly hand on his shoulder and whispered encouragement to him.

The council's proxy wasn't permitted to speak to the chieftains, though it was obvious that he didn't agree with the course that the deliberations seemed to be taking. He shook his head in disbelief then addressed himself to the man who had lain with...one of them...maybe even the one that he'd secretly desired. Where was she, anyway?

"Do you swear that you will never use the spell on any fairy, including your accomplice, unless you are prepared to commit yourself fully, and that you will never divulge the spell to another?"

Gareth, surprised by the simplicity of the question, nodded. "I swear."

"Very well," the centaur said with sonorous resignation, "It is the decision of the council that while your actions have not all been honorable, your current stance is. Therefore we will allow you to leave this place, knowing that if you should break this vow, you will die."

Gareth bowed in thanks and turned to leave with Hagrid. He looked back, to no avail, for a glimpse of his fairy temptress.

Onyx and Puff returned soon after their departure. Onyx sniffed hungrily, wondering why she imagined she could smell Man. Puff no longer allowed her to speak to anyone else though, so no one told her about the visit of the two men.

She didn't know she was free.


	19. Intervention

Hermione had always hated flying. That was for her one of the side benefits to vanquishing Voldemort—no more wild flights with dare-devil Harry on brooms or hippogriffs or thestrals...

But Witches for Wizarding Welfare liked to preserve some traditions, arriving at their meeting site on brooms, wearing black robes and pointed hats.

The Saturday after her St. Mungo's visit, Ron surprised Hermione by offering to take her flying, in preparation for the meeting later that week. They rode out in the country at a leisurely pace, the wind caressing her face and hair, rather than hatefully whipping them.

Ron found a lovely, secluded spot by a lake. The only sounds of habitation were the fish splashing in the water. Hermione practiced on the broom for a while, with Ron offering encouragement, until she felt more comfortable. Then they had a picnic, summoning food from Hogwarts for their weekly feast.

She sighed in contentment as she chewed a drumstick, sitting close to her husband and looking out on the glassy surface of the lake, fringed by the evergreens that circled it.

They cleared the food away and Ron lay back on the blanket, with Hermione resting her head on his chest. His mood seemed to be pensive. "I've been very happy the last couple of months, Hermione."

"I have too, Ron-chy. We enjoy being together a lot more."

He closed his eyes and relived the happiest days, when he had felt completely accepted and appreciated, no one's second choice, lesser child or sidekick. "I want it to be real," he continued. "I want us to choose each other over anyone else, over and over again."

Hermione raised her head and rested it on her hands that were on his chest, studying Ron's face, the way she used to study runes.

He tilted his head in her direction to return the scrutiny. "The other day I saw the cabdriver who drove us to Harry's...remember?"

Hermione nodded slowly, still not taking her eyes off of him.

"She asked me to get a drink with her," Ron said. "She was pretty and I was flattered but I told her I just wanted to get home to you. She kept calling you a lucky lady."

Hermione smiled seductively, as she climbed on top of him. "Her opinion is noted but superfluous; I know how lucky I am."

She grabbed the edge of the blanket and began rolling them up in it with the broom. They disapparated from the lake and landed back in their bed, mid-roll, falling laughingly and still amorous, onto the carpeted floor.

* * *

She recalled that day and night and smiled, as she glided to a smooth landing at the meeting site. There was a giant cauldron in the center of the clearing. The full moon was huge and golden and so low in the sky that, from a distance, it seemed to touch the black, shadowy ground.

Hermione observed the witches attached to the society page of the Daily Prophet...benefactresses, celebrities and community activists.

She was touched to see Narcissa Malfoy with her sister Andromeda Tonks, who had lost a husband and daughter in the Wizarding War. Lucius Malfoy hadn't been able to buy his way out of an Azkaban sentence, when the extent of his involvement in bringing Voldemort back became known. With their lives in rubble like Hogwarts after the battle, the sisters had reconciled to help each other through their crises and were now inseparable.

_The power of love and healing—not only in individual relationships_, she realized, as Professor McGonagall held out her hands in greeting to Narcissa, _but in the wizards' collective mind and heart—is stronger than any magic we can do._

Did that mean she should also put aside her differences with her new boss? Sure, if he weren't working her like a house elf before the war to make himself look good. She was so busy she hadn't been able to see Gareth during the workday and Ron's unexpected outing on the weekend precluded a visit to the Forbidden Forest then as well. And she'd left things so bad between them.

Hannah and Luna interrupted her thoughts with girlish squeals. Luna reported to Hermione that Crookshanks missed her and they agreed she'd send her back to Hermione later that night.

The three school chums (the brightest witch of her age, the youngest and most promising healer at St. Mungo's and an enterprising businesswoman, who, through the Leaky Cauldron, now knew everyone) joined the circle around the cauldron. The enormous pot bubbled with potion, a diluted Draught of Peace, which instilled a sense of goodwill in all of those within its sphere.

Hermione's heartbeat accelerated, as she looked around the circle at all of the witches, young and old. Their faces became benign and glowing from absorbing the potion's vapors and being so close to the flames under the cauldron.

This was the most witch-y thing she'd ever done, the kind of thing that she'd only dreamt about in the muggle world.

She reflected on her teenage summers at home with her parents, spending time in the town's library, reading about witches and wizards from a muggle perspective. Something she'd found most interesting was that witches typically didn't ascribe to the same moral code and tenets as muggles. They had been much freer sexually than their non-magical neighbors, hence the fervor to purge them and their temptations from society throughout history.

Professor McGonagall-standing tall at the top of the circle and holding the giant spoon in the cauldron, as another presider would hold a gavel-began the meeting. "We welcome a new sister to our coven," she intoned. "Hermione Granger Weasley has distinguished herself since her first day at Hogwarts. She was an exceptional student and a key player in protecting us all during our darkest days. Her love and dedication for her adopted world are an example for all. We look forward to great things from you, Hermione."

Beneath her pointed hat Hermione's face warmed even more with her blush, as her sister witches tipped their heads in silent recognition and welcome. The convergence of their hats over the cauldron created a spiky bull's-eye, from which a great roiling began then a bubble rose. Its light blue color and reflection of Hermione on its face indicated acceptance. A red bubble would have represented rejection and humiliation.

The coven then divided into its regular sub-groups. Hermione joined McGonagall's education committee.

"How are you, dear?" asked the professor, putting an arm around Hermione as they walked to the area of the clearing where their other committee members gathered.

"I'm fine, Professor, but I haven't been in the forest in over a week. Do you know if everything is alright there? I left things...unresolved the last time I was there."

The professor's mouth suddenly drew into a wrinkled pucker and she stopped to look at Hermione. "No. You must understand, Hermione, that I do not condone your behavior. I only assisted because Mr. Scabior appealed to my long-held belief that he suffered needlessly when he was a boy, and that those experiences contributed to his later downfall."

"But, Professor, witches aren't dictated by muggle conventions about sex," Hermione said in her defense, gripping the folds of her robe, as if she could hold onto her ally.

McGonagall shook her head. "While we may be more lenient than our non-magical counterparts, we do place a high value on loyalty. I have a grudging affection for your husband, Hermione, though I do think the two of you married too young. You obviously had other facets of yourself to explore too. If you continue to do so, I hope you remain discreet and always keep in mind your amusing, red-haired mate," she said with a little chuckle.

She resumed their walk to the edge of the clearing. "It is my hope that you may soon be ready to commit to him fully. I believe, knowing what we both do about his life, that that is especially important to him, is it not?"

Hermione dropped her head. "Thank you, Professor; you've given me a lot to think about."

McGonagall laid a relenting hand over the younger woman's as they sat down on some boulders. "And we know from experience that when you begin to think, the outcome is usually wise and for the best."

"Attention, sisters," McGonagall said, calling the smaller group to order, "perhaps our newest member would like to share with us her opinion on early intervention for the children of muggles..."


	20. Threee

_Puff want 'Nyx but 'Nyx still want Man._

The plump little fairy with the bright rosy skin and hair looked at Onyx, sleeping turned away from her, and lamented her current situation. She had always admired the black fairy from afar, never thinking that she would return her interest. She'd been so thrilled when Onyx took her with her that day, that she was willing to let Man kiss her for the chance of being close to Onyx.

She sighed, reliving the last few days. _'Nyx mean to Puff so Puff mean to 'Nyx. Tell 'Nyx do bad things. Puff not think 'Nyx do everything Puff say but 'Nyx do to save Man. Man not good as 'Nyx. _A tear trickled down her face, catching on her fine facial hair, as she concluded, _Puff not good as 'Nyx._

She kept Onyx isolated from everyone but had heard herself about the appearance of the two men before the council and the confession that one of them knew the Woman Spell.

_Man said not want 'Nyx. Puff try but not make 'Nyx want Puff._

Onyx awoke then and stretched. Puff's breath caught a little. She was like a pink caterpillar admiring the sleekness of the black snake that arched sensuously.

At the sight of Puff, Onyx remembered her plight and assumed a humble attitude, awaiting instruction.

Puff flourished a pencil eraser-sized hand and said, " 'Nyx leave."

"What?"

The chubby fairy turned her head away. "Puff not want 'Nyx. Go."

The constant tension in Onyx's face and body began to ease, but she still had to ensure Scabior's safety. "Puff not tell about Man?" She regarded Puff's full-cheek profile and pout.

"No, Puff not tell."

Onyx's smile was like the sun breaking through the storm clouds. " 'Nyx thank Puff," she exlaimed.

Puff turned her head and fixed her grey eyes on the most beautiful fairy. "Man still not want 'Nyx."

" 'Nyx know," she said, dropping her eyes a little, "but still Man safe."

Puff shrugged her teeny round shoulders in a show of nonchalance. "Yes, Man safe."

" 'Nyx thank Puff," Onyx said again, flying away quickly.

She watched her go. _'Nyx glad to be away from Puff, _she said to herself with a sigh. _Puff hurt._

* * *

When Professor Slughorn first suggested that he needed unicorn hair for potions instruction and that he'd be happy to pay Scabior a monthly stipend for collecting it, the former thief laughed in his face.

"You think I don't know the value of unicorn hair?" he asked with a sneer. "You'll pay me monthly, plus half of what you get for it. And if you don't like it, I'll cut out the middle man and sell it m'self."

Slughorn spluttered and harrumphed, his jowls jiggling, but because he couldn't gather the treasure himself, he gave in to the demands of his new, street-wise partner.

Gareth used to whistle when he performed that particular task, thinking of the gold it would net him. He'd carefully remove the soft tufts from the brambles and limbs on which it caught and comb it smooth. But that was when he divided his time between Hermione and Onyx. Now he had neither and hair-hunting was just another drudgery in his dreary days.

He walked through the forest with his collection bag over his shoulder. He was more agile than Hagrid and able to retrieve the precious strands by climbing, crawling and jumping—things that the lumbering half-giant just couldn't do.

He combed a skein that he found from the rare black unicorn and compared it to the silkiness of Onyx's hair, glancing around him for any sign of the tiny fairy. He stared at the scorches on his arm, as if willing them to burn to announce Hermione's arrival.

Of course there were other temptations. Around Gareth there always would be. He politely turned down all invitations from the women of Hogsmeade and ignored the students who had taken to hanging out at the entrance to the forest.

He knew that after his two most recent...associations, that any other woman would be a disappointment—like going back to choke down liver after a succulent dessert.

First there was Hermione, with her early freshness and wonder, as he expanded her sensual world. In this too she had excelled after initial instruction and, in some ways, surpassed her teacher. "Burn, dammit," he scolded his untroubled arm.

Onyx, as the temptress that he should have never seen, clouded his senses then sharpened them. She probably loved him more than anyone else ever had, and he should have never seen her. _Figures,_ he said to himself, unconsciously chanting "Freya…Ferleia…Free".

He'd hurt them; he knew that they'd both be better off he'd never known them. Still, he worried what would become of them without his understanding of them.

He spotted a promising tress on the lower branches of a young elm tree and climbed it to reach the drooping locks. "Aaah, Gold," he muttered with disgust, throwing down the stray hair from his own horse's mane.

The arm that he'd used...did he feel a tingle? He sucked his breath back between his teeth. He was no longer accustomed to that pain. The arm was burning. He jumped out of the tree and sprinted toward his glass cabin, leaving the bag of valuable unicorn hair behind.

* * *

Hermione began her day by pinning her hair back in a tight bun and putting on her longest, baggiest robe. She buttoned the shirt underneath it all the way to the top, considering the slight pinch on her larynx a just penance.

She leaned over Ron and nipped his ear between her lips to say good-bye. He was sleeping in after a stake-out the night before that had resulted in multiple arrests. It would probably mean another commendation for her ginger auror.

He emitted the sounds of a satisfied man, pulled her head down for a throaty kiss and whispered, "Have a good day, my veela."

She gave her cat a big squeeze. "I missed you," she crooned into his scratchy fur. Crookshanks responded with a purr that, like humming through paper against a comb, made her lips tingle. He was happy to be back and happy to find that her thoughts were less sexual in nature, except for those about her spouse.

Hermione sang to herself as she smiled in greeting to co-workers and friends, walking through the building's cavernous corridors up to her own office. Things were so good with Ron. Professor McGonagall's talk had helped her put things in perspective. It was best just to never see Gareth again. He understood her so well, he'd understand that.

On her desk were her projects for the day—reviewing the reports of the community advisors on the parolees assigned to them (she put Aberforth's to the side for another co-worker to review, in exchange for one of his) and determining the next Azkaban prisoners to be evaluated.

She clicked off the names, comparing their moving photos to the biographies, working with detachment and efficiency, until...the young blond man with green eyes appeared.

She stared at his photo, her hands beginning to shake and pulse increasing, imagining, as she had in her dream, lying down with him on the cold stone floor of the evaluation room. Somehow the thought this time was more exciting than confusing, as it had been the night of her punishment.

Of course she wouldn't do that, but she could open herself up a little to the advances that he was bound to make...No, she couldn't. Ron wanted her to choose him, all of the time.

Well, technically speaking, that wasn't an issue, because Ron wouldn't be there for her to make a choice. _But it's just hypothetical, _she said to herself. _Even if I were tempted, I requested to be removed from Azkaban rotation. I suppose that could be easily retracted if I wished, especially with this department in an uproar, now that __**he's **__in charge._

She impulsively composed a memo...

_In light of the changes occurring in this department, perhaps my request to be removed from Azkaban assignment was hasty. I volunteer to handle the next series of evaluations to allow more time for training (_of the completely ignorant, incompetent supervisor, she added to herself under her breath.)

The response was almost immediate_...No. You're needed here. Do you have those advisor reports done yet_?

She glared at the reply. "The nerve, how dare he?" she exclaimed to her empty office. "He's as arrogant and infuriating as he ever was."

Her mind went back to the one afternoon with Gareth when he'd said, "there were other people at school who thought about you and wanted you. You just scared the hell out of them."

"Hmm, maybe I should try being a little less scary," she said mischievously, as she removed her robe, released her hair from its tight knot and un-did the first couple of buttons on her shirt. Her interest in the prisoner receded in her mind, as she thought more about the conquest—exercising her power of attraction on a man who had denied her what she wanted.

She went from her office to his on the other side of the department's central room. The support staff, sitting in front of old manual typewriters that punched the keys themselves, glanced up in surprise. Hermione had steadfastly ignored the new boss since he'd arrived.

"Enter," said that imperious, nasal voice when she knocked on the door. She saw him sitting at his desk, his head bent down. His family coat of arms on the wall over his head was the only decoration in the stark room.

The top of his head looked like a striped pattern of pink scalp and wispy white-blond hair. He'd be bald in another year or so without magical intervention, she realized with an inward snicker.

"What do you want?" he asked scornfully when he raised his head and saw who was standing there.

Hermione smiled. The grin was sneaky and predatory, like a young female crocodile approaching a male. "Funny, I was about to ask you the same thing," she said, slinking in, to sit in the chair opposite him.

His squinty eyes were fixed on her, especially her legs, as she crossed them. This wasn't the first time since their early days at Hogwarts that he'd watched those legs, and he could see them so well with the skirt she was wearing. She'd taken off the Ministry robe, he saw. He cleared his throat and pulled his eyes to her face, "What does that mean?"

"Well," she began, twisting slightly in her chair to draw more attention to herself, "I offer to do something for the department by making one last Azkaban visit and you say no because I'm needed here. So, I was wondering...what do you want from me, Draco?"

Malfoy stared. She was the same Hermione Granger—dynamic and assured-but she didn't seem so...untouchable, or was that his imagination?

He swallowed again then, smiling and as though they shared a secret, he said, "Maybe before I answer, I should know how much I can ask for."

That smile and his smarmy voice caused her to recoil. _What are you doing?_ she asked herself. She pushed back in her chair as if to get away from him. The implications of what she was doing in there hit her and, with audible disgust, she jumped up from the chair and ran back to her office, like she was being chased by something. The support staff looked up again with even more curiosity.

Back at his desk, Malfoy shook his head to clear it. "Yeah, just my imagination...she's as frigid as ever. She'd better get those reports done damn quick. I told the director I'd have them ready this afternoon."

In her office, Luna's words came back to Hermione, "That power (of attraction) can be a dangerous thing...it can turn on you. Your need for that feeling might become stronger than the want you inspire in someone."

She grabbed her robe and her wand and, as she'd done many times when on the lam with Ron and Harry, disapparated to escape.


	21. Choices for Comfort

The glass cabin was empty when Hermione apparated there. She ran out and began searching for Scabior. "Where is he?" she asked out loud, a note of panic in her voice.

The forest, which she'd begun to think of as welcoming, seemed to close in on her. She felt the leaves from the trees swatting her in admonition as she ran through them and the eyes of the woodland creatures assessing her guilt.

She looked about in confusion, as she realized she'd gone in a circle. She dejectedly sat, her face buried in her arms, in front of the copse of evergreens that encapsulated Gareth's home.

"How did this happen?" She voiced her questions, as if hearing them aloud could provide her with better answers. "I thought my life would be simple after everything we went through in school. How did it get so complicated now? At least I used to like myself. Now I'm abhorrent, I'm reprehensible, I'm deceitful, I'm..."

"...one of the most lovable witches anywhere," broke in Gareth, dropping to his knees next to her. Their brown eyes searched the other's for a level of interest or concern. They reached a silent, mutual understanding for compassion, rather than passion—friendship over frenzy.

"Oh, Gareth," Hermione cried as she placed her arms around his neck and gave in to her tears, "I don't know what to do. I'm so...baffled. I've never been so uncertain of myself."

He held her lightly and stroked her hair. "I'm sorry, Hermione," he said, managing to make his raspy voice soothing, like gentle exfoliation. "Tell me what's wrong."

"I'm losing control of myself," she said in a voice tinged with fear. "I don't know what I'm going to do next and I don't want to hurt or embarrass Ron. Today I was on the verge of seducing Draco Malfoy," she said with a shudder, "so that he'd send me to Azkaban so that I could seduce a prisoner there. I'm disgusting," she added, dropping her arms from his neck and her chin to her chest, as if awaiting shearing of her hair for moral vilification.

Gareth looked down at her—so young. Her confidence had actually made her easier to lure than another woman might have been. She could convince herself that whatever she did was justified, more so than someone dependent on social convention for guidance, as long as she stayed within the boundaries she'd undoubtedly created for herself. At the top of that list, apparently, was not doing harm to Weasley.

He stood and held out his hands for her. "Come inside. I'll get you something to eat; you look like you could use it."

She allowed him to pull her up, thinking, _a surprisingly sweet man._

She sat at the table against the front wall. The bed was opposite. Gareth had a small kitchen area on the right side of the room and his storage chest and closet were on the other side.

He brought her a peanut butter sandwich and glass of milk. She smiled at the sheer hominess and Muggle-ness of his choices for comfort—a most atypical wizard.

Sitting next to her with his own glass, he said, "You almost did that, Hermione. In the end you didn't. I'm still the only other man you've been with, no matter how much you've thought about others...right?"

She chewed her sandwich and nodded.

He smiled at her. "I'm flattered that I would cause Ron less hurt and embarrassment than your old classmate. But don't you see, Hermione, you couldn't do it. It was a bridge you wouldn't cross. You have more control than you think."

She lowered her head and shook it doubtfully. "It's only because it was Malfoy and I've always found him so loathsome. Anyone else...I don't know. That's what scares me. I don't know anymore what I could accept," she said, her voice cracking at the end of her admission.

He picked up her wand from the table. "Send a message to your husband that you'll meet him at the Three Broomsticks in an hour for a romantic weekend."

Eyeing him skeptically, she did so then laid the wand down again. She stared at Scabior, whom she'd come to know as someone resourceful, smart and genuinely interested in her outside of bed. "I don't know. Maybe I should stay here with you," she said with a sad little laugh. "You won't let me get away with the things that Ron will. He loves me too much."

"That wouldn't hurt him?"

She shrugged. "I could just...vanish. No one would have to know I'm here. It would be better than becoming a totally disreputable woman and making him a laughing stock," she wept in saying.

Gareth gave her a napkin for her tears. "But, Hermione, you don't love me."

Sniffling, she said, "Maybe that's better. We won't have a lot of emotions clouding things for us. It can be elemental, like your magic...or like the faun and little nymph."

Scabior got up from the table to take her plate and glass to the kitchen, surreptitiously picking up her wand. "The faun and the nymph, huh?" He approached her from behind, as she continued to dab her eyes.

"You forget, Hermione," he spoke into her ear, "the faun loves his little Rose...and I love you. Entranca."

Hermione's head dropped back with her eyes closed. Gareth looked at the slight blush in the hollow of her throat and the long line of her neck. He touched it lightly then, with a resigned sigh, he picked her up and carried her to the bed. He knelt at the side of it and stroked her face.

"You were the softest, loveliest thing I'd ever held. But I shouldn't've bothered you. What's happened to you is my fault. I used the innocence and inexperience of you and Ron to draw you to me. And I made you think it would be helpful for the two of you. But the truth is, it would've happened for you both before long, if for no other reason because he wanted that with you so bad. I rushed things and confused you. You're not living with this guilt; I'm not living with this guilt. Ron will be different than you remember him, more confident and...ready. Don't fight him."

He waved the wand in front of her face and lifted her from the bed.

With the trance removed, Hermione opened her mouth to speak. Still holding the wand, Gareth grabbed her hand and disapparated the two of them to the Hogwarts back gate. Again she tried to speak. He turned her away from him and haltingly whispered "Obliviate enamora".

Hermione looked around in confusion. _How did I get here, _she asked herself. _The last thing I remember..._

"Mrs. Weasley, you dropped your wand," said a voice behind her.

She spun around and saw a man with dark hair and eyes. He looked familiar...

"Your wand," he said again with a smile that showcased crinkly eyes and dimples.

_Must be someone different, _she thought. The man that he reminded her of, she associated with something dark and ominous...not such a nice smile.

"Thank you, Mr..."

"Gareth Scabior," he said, the smile dropping somewhat.

She registered the name with a small, involuntary gasp.

He continued quickly, "I was released from Azkaban a couple of months ago after your favorable evaluation."

(Her expression was confused)

"I'm working here now, as Hagrid's assistant. It's going good."

"Oh, well I'm happy to hear that," she said, grasping her wand firmly in both hands.

He grinned at her and glanced down at the wand. The messaging accessory was glowing. "I believe you have a message," he said.

"Oh." She put the tip of the wand to her temple and heard Ron's voice... "Three Broomsticks is a great idea. I'm leaving now and will meet you there. I will exhaust you, my veela...Ron-chy."

Her cheeks turned warm and pink as she listened to him. That didn't sound like Ron. And where did he get such silly nicknames?

"When a newlywed blushes like that, the message must be from her husband," Scabior said.

Hermione looked up in surprise. She hadn't realized he was still there. Why was he still there?

"If you don't mind my saying, Ms. Granger-Weasley, he's a very lucky man."

She mumbled thank you then quickly turned away from him and headed to the inn for her rendesvouz. _"_Ron-chy," she said with a giggle.

Gareth watched her hurry away from him and laid his hand over the rune combination that would never burn again. He headed for the Hog's Head for Aberforth to give him firewhiskey in discreet butterbeer bottles.

Hermione opened the door at their old hangout and saw Ron's red head by the staircase. He crooked his finger at her with a wink. She couldn't keep from grinning as she went to join him. He rubbed the outside of her leg closest to the wall, as they passed others on the stairs. At the top he picked her up and ran down the hall, throwing open a door for the room he'd already rented.

He slammed the door with his foot and set her down. He waved his wand across her and her clothes flew off, landing in a neat pile on the antique bureau across from the over-sized bed. She took the hint and the challenge and did the same to him. They had not spoken a word to each other. He inclined his head toward the bed.

Hermione stared at him, excited by the intensity of his expression and the desire she could sense from him. She slowly backed up to the bed, not taking her eyes off of him.

He was a benign stalker, pushing her forward and turning her on her stomach when she reached the destination. His hand ran lightly down her back and across her buttocks. She turned her head to watch him, as he continued stroking the back of her legs then, after a moment's hesitation, gliding his fingers up the inside. Her breathing increased and she instinctively tensed.

Ron grinned as he felt the resistance. He was no longer discouraged by it. He put his head down on her back and began rolling it across the surface, massaging her muscles and following with little kisses. He heard her moan and returned his hand to where it was before. Ron plied her flesh and she began thrashing, turning her head from side to side.

His mouth reached the back of her neck and ear. "I love you, Hermione," he said hoarsely. "You're the only thing I've ever really wanted." He rolled her onto her back and put her arms around his neck, continuing his purposeful carress. "You're mine," he declared with gruffness, "I'll fight anyone for you."

Her eyes closed as she reacted to his voice, seducing her just as surely as his touch. She gasped again as she felt him enter. "Ron," she whispered, moving in synch with him. Her fingers ran through his hair and she raised herself to bury her nose in the smell of sandalwood. "Ron," she said again, her voice a little louder, as his hands roamed freely and his mouth sought hers.

He lay back so that she straddled him. She rotated her hips and threw back her head, saying his name over and over as her excitement mounted.

Aurors learned basic spells to perform without wands, in case they were taken from them. Ron tore his eyes from Hermione to the door. "Muffliato," he mumbled, just in case...

"Ron!" she screamed, as she felt her body convulse and her head fill with giddiness.

He joyously rolled her onto her back and planted fevered kisses on her face and neck. She cried out again when she felt his pulses then collapsed against his chest, as he pulled her up into his arms and rocked with her.

"My veela," he groaned.

"Ron-chy," she sighed.

* * *

Aberforth Dumbledore watched Gareth, who stared at the bottle more than he drank from it.

"You did a good thing," the older man said.

Gareth nodded and brought the bottle to his lips.

"So what are you doin' here now?" Aberforth asked, as he wiped the bar around the brooding man.

Scabior raised his eyes to him. "Where else should I be?"

Aberforth tossed the cloth over his shoulder. "As I recall when you were in here the last time, the Granger girl was only part of your worries."

Gareth looked down at the bottle again and unconsciously traced its lines with a finger, as if it were a particularly pleasing body. "I can't."

"Why?"

Gareth leaned back and looked away. He took in the rough wooden walls and dirt floor, being given a certain beauty by the flames from the fireplace that turned them a red-gold tone. "I'm no better for her and she's...like a dream, not for real life."

Aberforth rolled his eyes. "Scabe, you've never had a real life. It would be nice if one of us could. I couldn't...commit..."

Gareth turned his head in surprise at the word.

"...because of my duty to Ariana."

This time he looked away. His long white beard didn't muffle the regret in his voice. "You'll miss her every day, my friend."

Both men were quiet with their thoughts.

Aberforth tilted his head at Gareth, saying, "Wanna show you somethin'".

Gareth walked around to the other side of the bar, as his community advisor lifted a trap door.

"Not even the marauders knew about this one," Abe said. "It comes out in the middle of the forest."

Gareth looked down the long flight of steep stairs. Aberforth handed him a lantern and patted his shoulder, encouraging the younger man with "Freia...ferleia..."

Scabior descended the steps. _A real life, _he said to himself, _a dream life, _he continued, _with a woman of my own...beautiful, sexy but innocent, smart, sweet, loves me..._"Onyx," he yelled, beginning to run, as he saw the end of the tunnel. "Onyx," he shouted over and over. He realized he was in the fairies' gorge.

Onyx caught his scent; she heard her name. She allowed her senses to guide her. Gareth emerged from the tunnel, running and calling for her.

She flew to him. He dropped to his knees and held her in his open hand, using the other one to press the magic into her miniscule body, while his lips frantically moved, reciting the Woman Spell.

Then he was looking up at the most beautiful creature in the forest. He rose to embrace her.

"Gaaaaar," she spoke in a wispy, unpracticed voice, "want 'Nyx?"

"Yes," he answered with an emphatic nod, taking off his shirt to put over her.

"Al-ways?"

"Always...on pain of death," he loudly proclaimed, turning to the ancient willow tree where the chieftains gathered.

Her heartbeat pounded against his chest. He grinned at her and touched her face. "Man love 'Nyx." She smiled in response.

The rumbling neigh of his giant, intuitive horse sounded above them.

Onyx fluttered her wings beneath the large shirt and floated them to the upper level of the forest and onto the horse's back.

"Let's go Gold," commanded Gareth. "Let's take her home."

The only person from H-House to ever be expelled, the Azkaban inmate who learned care of magical creatures, absorbed and seconded the declarations of love transmitted to him by the loveliest forest inhabitant-the perfect real woman for the most atypical wizard.


	22. Epilogue: Of a Personal Nature

Hermione waved her wand and the large dresser slid from the right side of the room to the wall in front of her. She waved it again and the drapes on the windows to her left changed from the deep cranberry color to a floral pattern that let in the sunlight.

She squinted at the sudden glare and returned everything to its original state, leaving the drapes opened. She was bored with redecorating. She had a slew of books surrounding her on the bed but couldn't concentrate to read. It was useless to try to watch television, because she couldn't see it while lying down over her heavily-pregnant stomach. Suspending the device in mid-air exhausted her.

She sighed, chastising herself for her attitude, and lovingly stroked her expanded body. She was in confinement under Healer Lovegood's orders for protection of herself and the baby after two previous miscarriages.

"For you, little girl," she whispered. What were they going to name her? She and Ron had gone through all of the names in both of their families and nothing sounded right—just another frustration in what was undoubtedly the most frustrating period of her life.

Oh well, her packet from work should be arriving soon. That would give her something to do. The smartest thing she'd ever done in her career was transfer out of the prisoner rehabilitation section when Malfoy became her supervisor. She'd risen steadily in her job in international relations and really was on track to being minister, if she chose to continue. Ron was so proud of her.

"Ron-chy," she said with the passion that thinking of her wonderful husband always elicited from her. After their initial newlywed awkwardness, they had seemed to turn a corner around the ninth or tenth month and their life had been extremely satisfying for both of them in the years since. Ron had been even more attentive and sensitive to her needs during this pregnancy and delighted in discovering new ways to make her moan and squeal without intercourse.

She looked impatiently at the clock. He'd be arriving soon for lunch with her—something to look forward to anyway.

She looked toward the window at the sound of a sudden peck. She saw an unfamiliar and very rare red owl sitting on the ledge with a white ribbon in its beak to indicate correspondence of a personal nature.

Her interest piqued, she waved the wand to open the window and the unique courier entered, landing next to her on the bed and holding out the leg with the small scroll.

She removed it and the owl, wearing a tag identifying her as Ruby, gave a friendly, polite little "whooo".

"What a well-trained bird," Hermione said, giving her part of an apple from her omnipresent fruit bowl.

Ruby ate the morsel then flew around the room, dipping and looping in an aerobatics performance for Hermione's entertainment. She clapped in delight and the owl flew to the window, perched on the sill, then dipped a wing to acknowledge the applause and flew away.

"Amazing," she exclaimed, realizing then that Ruby hadn't stayed for a return message. "Guess I'm not supposed to respond," she surmised, unrolling the parchment. A photo fell away from the letter and fluttered to the bed. Hermione glanced at it and saw a very attractive man and woman with a little boy but she didn't know who they were. She eagerly read the letter:

_My Dear Ms. Granger-Weasley,_

_I have heard that you are soon to have a baby and must stay in bed until delivery. It seemed like a good time to contact you. I hope it won't sound strange for me to say that I take some gratification in your joy and accomplishments. Those reasons will soon be made plain to you._

_I have enclosed a photo of my own family. My beautiful wife Onyx and I are unable to have children ourselves, but we adopted the devilish-looking little guy you see here, after the sudden death of his family._

Hermione smiled at the image of the squirming young boy and his very photogenic parents. Were those wings on the woman's back?

_Professor McGonagall has requested that we stay here in the Forbidden Forest for life, assuming Hagrid's duties as its chief caretaker when he retires. Who knows? Maybe I'll someday take over too as instructor for Care of Magical Creatures. It might encourage more female participation in the subject._

She looked at the man in the photo and at that moment he winked and smiled to reveal his dimples. Her breath caught as she recognized him. Scabior? She returned to the letter.

_You have probably remembered me at this point and wondered why I have written. As I said, it will soon be made clear to you. Please know that I hold you in the highest regard and thank you every day for restoring my humanity and making my life possible._

_In closing, I request that you hold your wand to your temple and say, "Recollecto Enamora"._

Curious at the strange instruction, Hermione followed it and a panorama of images and memories came to her, beginning with a portentous meeting at Azkaban...a naked Scabior demonstrating for her how she should kiss and tempt Ron...more time with the dark-haired man in bed...rides on a giant horse...a confrontation and then..."the faun loves his little Rose...and I love you."

Hermione had her own memory of what she'd always thought to be a random encounter with Scabior outside the back gate of Hogwarts, and his alerting her to the message from Ron... _He's a lucky man._

"He gave me a clean slate and directed me to Ron." She still loved recalling that weekend at The Three Broomsticks, when she felt that she truly fell in love and lust with her husband, a condition that had only grown stronger ever since.

She looked at Scabior's picture again, the way any happily-married woman would gaze fondly and objectively at a photo of an old boyfriend. "Gareth," she whispered with a smile, "thank you."

Crookshanks' purr announced the arrival of Ron. Hermione put aside the letter and held out her arms for him. He sailed lightly onto the bed next to her, gently placing an arm over her temporary girth, as he asked, "How's my gorgeous, pregnant veela?"

* * *

_**a/n In spite of the drama in this story and questions that might have been created in people's minds if it could ever be possible for things to be right with Ron and Hermione, I was extremely mindful of canon throughout. The end game had to be the two of them in the happy marriage shown in the final chapter of the final book. **_  
_**Since they'd had so many issues, though, throughout the original story that would have affected that and so little was revealed about their romance, it seemed a promising area for speculation and expansion.  
In the end **__**Ron had more lessons to learn than Hermione. She wasn't really aware of anything lacking until Scabior suggested it to her. Ron was but, as was stated in Chapter 2, he took his cues from her and lived with his frustrations and feelings of inadequacy. **_  
_**With the encouragement he got from Hermione as a result of her new-found passion and eagerness to not slight Ron while she was involved with Scabior, he became more confident and demonstrative, which was what had been needed for them to actually "turn the corner".**_  
_**I hope it came out for the majority of readers that Gareth's love for Onyx was much stronger than that for Hermione but he felt an obligation to her and, at the same time, didn't think he deserved Onyx .  
And if the use of magic to resolve everything seemed too simple, please remember that it was magic that made a lot of the events in the story possible in the first place. Emotions may be universal but not necessarily situations.**_  
_**Thanks for reading to the end. I hope you enjoyed it. Vera**_


End file.
